Second Death
by Weezila
Summary: Peter knew Nico in 1942. Cameron met the son of Hades in 2015. Where had that hyper little boy he'd once called a little brother gone? The Ghost King grew up, but what about him? (very Nico-centric)
1. March 28th, 1942

**Hello Internet,**

**This is a random little thing that's been on my hard drive for about three years now and I'm tired of ignoring it. I'm posting it and stuff, and if anyone has any ideas as to how it should end, I'm all ears.**

**Enjoy **

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"_You look sad." A sharp voice cut through Peter's daze. _

"_What?" He said stupidly, and looking up to see a boy with messy black hair staring intensely at him. _

"_You look sad." He repeated like he thought Peter was stupid or something. Peter was not stupid, and took offense. _

"_No duh, there's a war going on." His spoke roughly, but softly, trying not to draw attention to his German accent. However, the boy didn't seem to care about his nationality._

"_Yes, but you shouldn't care. You've got bigger problems." He told him like it was the funniest thing in the world. This kid had to be what? Nine or ten years old? Peter was easily twice his age and wasn't in the mood. He'd just spent the last year on the world's hardest journey from war-ridden Germany to the capital of the free world. His feet hurt, his head hurt, his spirit hurt. He couldn't deal with this kid right now. _

"_Whatever. Go away please." He sighed, leaning his head against the back of the park tree he was sitting under, closing his eyes and trying to relax. _

"_Uh, no." the boy said, and he opened one eye. _

"_Excuse me?" He asked incredulously. Awfully rude this kid was. _

"_I said 'no'. You're a demigod, and demigods shouldn't be sitting under trees in the open, unarmed. Especially when me and my sister are in the same park. You're gonna get killed!" He smirked like that would be very entertaining to him. Peter didn't understand a word of that, and was half debating just kicking the kid to get him to leave. _

"_Sure kid, whatever. I'm a god! Wooo! Now, do my bidding and go away." He sighed, leaning back. The kid frowned. _

"_DEMI-god. You're too ugly to be a REAL god." Peter's eyes snapped open and he glared at the boy. "Besides, if you don't believe me, care to explain why you can speak ancient Greek?" Peter sat bolt upright. _

"_I'm not speaking Greek!" He denied instantly, but even as he said it, he could hear the words as if from far away and knew they were Greek. He just __**knew**__ it was Greek, AND he knew what it meant. How the HELL did that happen?! "What's going on?" He asked, panicked, and the boy started to laugh. It was kind of evil sounding and Peter got Goosebumps_

"_Nico! Ce ne andiamo! Vieni presto!" A voice called from down the path in the park. Was that Italian? _

"_Sto arrivando__! __Bianca,__vieni a conoscere__Peter__! __Mi__è come__noi, ma__non credo che__lui sa che__è__ancora__un semidio!"__ The boy shouted back to the voice, in perfect Italian. Peter heard his name, but how did the boy know that? He was suddenly on edge. What the hell was going on? He must be sleep-deprived from his trip or something…_

_A girl appeared from behind the trees. She looked a lot like the boy, and it was then Peter realized they both looked very Italian. Just the features and stuff…. But they were both so pale, it was impossible. _

"_Chi è questo?" She asked the boy. She might have been thirteen or fourteen. She regaurded the kid very motherly like, so she seemed older, but was definitly younger than Peter. _

"_Peter." The shorter boy replied and Peter wondered again how he knew that. "And he's a demigod." Peter rocognized the Greek this time. _

"_Ok, WHAT the heck's a demigod?" He demanded._

_The girl looked sympatheticly at him. "Do you know you're parents?" She asked calmly. What a stupid question, he thought. _

"_Yes, but they died in... in the war." He almost said 'the camps', but that was too much information to give a stranger. Especially in America. Peter only risked talking to them becasue they didn't seem to be natives to this country either. He didn't know how well talking to someone for the Allies side would like talking to a german speaking forgeiner. _

_The boy looked annoyed. "No, you're real parents! Not you're adopted parents!" Again, he wondered how the heck the boy knew that. The girl didn't seem surprised. _

"_Uh... my mother died in childbirth. My father never stayed." Why was he playing along to this maddness? _

"_Then you're father was a god."_

"_..."_

"_..."_

"_..."_

"_Pardon me?" _

"_You're father was a Greek god. Your mother was mortal, which makes you a demigod—or half god." The girl clarified for her brother._

_Ok, if he was half god, why didn't that come in handy trying to escape europe? Fat lot of good THAT did. _

"_You're crazy."_

"_Uh, no we're not." The boy chimed in. "Our dad's a god too! We're all demigods!" He cheered. _

"_Yeah, and i'm surprised we're not overrun by monsters yet." She said worriedly, glanceing around the park. _

"_OK, you've ALL had something put in your breakfast, becasue the ONLY way in HELL we'd be half god is if ... I don't even KNOW, but it's not possible, so could you all just PLEASE leave me alone!" Peter cried. He just wanted to relax for once. _

_The girl looked sympathetic, but the boy was staring at him strangely, as if he was trying to see through him. It made him nervous. _

"_Apollo." He finally said. Leaning back in triumph. _

"_Really? I supposed that fits. Blonde hair, killer teeth." She remarked, sizing him up. That wasn't the first time someone had commented on his blonde hair, and he was suddenly stressed. _

_He stood and started to walk away. _

"'_Blonde hair, blue eyes, live to see tomorrow's skies'." He boy sang softly and he froze in his tracks. _

"_What... was that?" He said stiffly, not turning around. _

"_Don't they say that? In the camps?"_

"_Come now Nico, that's not nice to bring up!" The girl scolded. _

"_But the Ghosts sang it! It's been stuck in my head for days!" He complained. _

_Ghosts? What was going on?_

_He turned back to them with questioning, frightened eyes. _

"_We're children of Hades. We see ghosts." The girl shrugged, but the boy—Nico or whatever- jumped up and down. _

"_And it's AWESOME!" He bellowed, while the girl tried to shut him up. _

"_It has it's moments..." She admitted, though she looked like she mostly disagreed with his statment. _

"_Hades...? Like... the UNDERWORLD Hades...?"_

"_Yep!" Nico grinned. _

"_Yes, and your dad was Apollo. God of the sun, archery, and medicine." The girl clarified. _

"_Cosa sta succedendo? Perché stai prendendo così tanto tempo?" A woman came down from the path to where they were. _

"_Niente! Abbiamo fatto un nuovo amico!" Nico said brightly to the woman who was obviously thier mother. She was the spititng image of the girl, but she had strangly light eyes. She really WAS Italian, with the slightly darker, tanned skin characteristic of the country, and except for her slightly lighter eyes than was natural for brunettes, was pretty much Peter's stereotype for Itailans. Well, except for the barette that looked like it'd fit on someone native to France. The girl gestured to Peter, who was staring at all of them in disbelif. Too much was happening. _

"_Parla greco?" She asked, and Peter generally understood that meant she was asking if he could speak greek. _

"_Ja, aber er kommt aus Deutschland!" With a jolt Peter realized the boy had spoken German, which he understood perfectly as ‚Yes, but he's from Germany!' _

„_Do you speak english as well?" He asked, suddenly in english, and Peter's head spun. How many languages did this kid know?_

„_Yes... a little." He really did have good english, but it wasn't great. _

„_Nice to meet you Peter." The woman said, in english as well, but with a heavy accent. „I take it you are like my children?" It took a moment for him to realize what she meant. _

„_My father..." He didn't know if she believed in that or not too. _

„_Is a Greek god?" She finished for him. So, she DID believe. _

„_That... it can't..." He didn't know what to say. It was easier to argure with the kids. An adult believing it too? That was too rich for his blood. _

„_I think we have much to talk about." She smiled gently at him. He suddeny felt a great surge of dread. _


	2. October 31st, 1942

_Seven months later he was sitting in the lobby of a hotel, still not believing everything that had happened since then. _

_So he was the son of Apollo. Perfect. _

_So a bunch of monsters were out to get him. That's just wonderful. _

_So the entire terrible war destroying the planet was between the children of two of the "Big Three" Greek gods. So Bianca and Nico were children of one of those gods. So Hitler was their half brother. So that god and their father was the lord of the Underworld. So that god was sitting on the other side of the lobby talking with the di Angelo's mother. _

_This is just freaking fantastic. _

_So he escaped one war, only to be told it wasn't the REAL war, and thrown right into the middle of THAT one. _

"_There's a camp up north a ways." Bianca had told him. "For demigods to train. Things are… well, they're pretty bad, but most of it is taking place in Europe right now. You'll learn more about what's really happening once you get to camp." _

_He was basically being sent off to find this 'camp' (the idea of which he DID NOT like one bit, but they assured him it was a nicer version of any camp he'd ever been to) fight off monsters along the way, train to fight and survive, and then being shipped off, right into the middle of the war he'd just escaped from. _

_Perfect. _

"_Stop it!" Nico cried. His sister was chasing him, trying to tickle him to death. _

_Even after the roller coaster the past years had been, everything happening in quick procession, one big event after another without stop, these months of simply living and being with the di Angelo's were a fantastic and a much yearned-for experience. He immensely enjoyed the opportunity to just sit peacefully and watch two siblings play: no hurry, no fears, no pain. Just, sitting and enjoying the October afternoon and the beautiful colors of the leaves outside the windows. He hadn't had an opportunity to enjoy beauty or innocence in near a decade. _

_Bianca had caught her little brother and was trying to pin him down as he howled in laughter, a big grin on both their faces. _

_For such an annoying kid, that sister of his really knew how to handle him. Peter wasn't a kid person, but Bianca was an expert. Their mother was wonderful as well, and she took Peter in like a long lost son. Not the very emotional type and stuff, she basically just started bringing back dinner for four instead of three, and asking if he had everything he needed before wishing him sweet dreams for the night. It meant everything to Peter, and though he tried to insist he was being a burden, she silenced him with a look before continuing on, like business as usual. Like she'd always had three kids instead of two. She didn't even acknowledge the change, it was like it had always been that way, Bianca and Nico playing right along with it. _

_How strange and beautifully wonderful. _

_She always seemed tired though, and it was obvious she was under a lot of stress. She talked to her kids like adults, and though Bianca took it in stride and tried to be the mother figure for Nico when she was out, it was all way above Nico's head. He was as active and annoying as ever, and it seemed too quiet when his mother and sister weren't snapping at him in Italian. _

_He'd do anything for them though, all they had to do was ask… though he'd forget a few minutes later and start it all up again. _

_Peter had actually learned to like the di Angelo kids these past months. Bianca was so quiet, yet had no problem telling someone off or commanding her family. And they listened too, even Nico. She seemed honestly cheered playing with Nico, but very tired as well, just like their mother. She looked like an overworked parent with a hyperactive, oblivious child, who tried to be good for her, but honestly couldn't help himself. Nico himself was still irritating, but in an endearing sort of way. His perkiness and innocence, even when talking about ghosts and dead people, and the way he was so confident about everything, was nice. _

_Nico talked about hell like it was a summer home, and Peter found it unnerving. Knowing there was an Underworld was kind of comforting though, in a morbid sort of way. If Peter died tomorrow, he knew he'd be ok. He survived a concentration camp; he saved a dozen other boys too, and never hurt anyone no matter how much he wanted to defend himself. It physically hurt thinking of his past, but when he found the courage to remember, he knew he should be proud. Plus, Nico had told him he had a good soul, and he'd be fine. The kid was weird, and he still didn't know how he was doing it, but Peter decided somewhere along the lines to trust him. He seemed to be the only one who knew what he was doing. _

_He didn't know what it was, but being here, with them, it felt… right somehow. He wasn't running from a war, he wasn't trying to survive; he was simply living in a hotel with a make-shift family that was as close to anything he'd had in many years. Nico was a little twerp, but he felt like HIS annoying kid brother. Bianca was beautiful, but in a way that made him feel like he'd want to punch her future boyfriend's lights out. Ms. di Angelo was a substitute mother in a lot of ways: she was strict and unyielding, but always kind, loving, and welcoming—just like his own mother used to be. She'd adopted Peter like her own as he struggled to figure everything out. He'd told them all about his… past, and they were more than happy to take him in, and give him a sanctuary from everything he was dealing with. _

_He found himself thinking of a home that he left long ago as he watched Bianca and Nico play. _

_His mother- his real, biological mother- was only a girl when she had met his real father, Apollo. She was young, and lived in a tiny town in south Germany, where her parents owned an apothecary. He was told she was beautiful and always cheery, always with a smile for everyone she met. She could heal any wound and took care of the ill better than any doctor with all their fancy equipment and science. Knowing what he did about Apollo now, Peter didn't have to wonder at why he'd chosen her. _

_But then he left, before Peter was even born, and she died giving birth to him. Apollo, the god of healing and medicine, didn't save her. _

_He didn't know how he felt about that. He WAS a god, plenty busy and all that, and it kind of seemed to Peter like it was a god's right to toy with mortals, as unfair as it was. Peter couldn't bring himself to be angry with his father. He was a god, and an ass, but what were the chances he'd ever meet him? Slim to none at best, but Peter didn't mind. As a god, he was too far away, too unreal to him for Peter to really blame him. He'd given up caring about the past and things he couldn't change. Life was crap, and then you die, but everyone fought for it anyway. He didn't understand it, but he let it be. _

_His adopted parents raised him in that same little town his mother lived and died in. They owned a clock shop, and were strict but very kind people. So far as Peter was concerned, they were his real parents. They all lived in a small apartment over their store, and every morning they were up by seven ten, made a small breakfast and were immediately tending to the business below by seven thirty. They closed exactly at five, and as a family they went into town in search of dinner. They used to pick out only what they needed at the local market and take it down to a river or up to the fields and eat somewhere new every day. Strict, punctual, rhythmic; that was the life Peter knew. _

_When Hitler took over, they had no opinion either way for him. What did they care about the dealings in big cities far away? All they cared for was running their shop and getting what they needed to live. They lived simply, and with purpose. They gave to those less fortunate when they had excess and to the friends they knew were good, honest people, but they had no tolerance for the lazy or weak. They lived for the current day, for the moment, for their town, and nothing more. _

_When people started disappearing, and soldiers started 'passing by' their little remote village, they started to realize something was up. They weren't Jewish, they had no religion in particular, but some of their neighbors—good people, Peter's dad would declare them—vanished in the night. It didn't take them long to figure out what was happening. _

_Occasionally, a soldier would throw a rock through a Jewish store front, and his family's clock shop was hit more than once for their association with the Jewish people. _

_But his parents woke on those mornings as usual, cleaned up all the glass, and were open only ten minutes late. They refused to believe the horror going on around them- the panic at the SS and the SA and the Nazi supporters- and focused on their jobs. They pretended it wasn't happening and never allowed Peter to mention it either._

"_North, as far as you can go." Peter's mother had told him suddenly, out of the blue. He was trying to fix an old, small , table clock at his father's workbench in the shop one afternoon, and she just began to talk with no preamble. "Follow the train lines as north as you can possibly go, and then follow Bluebell until you reach water."_

"_What's that?" He asked, not sure what that meant. She didn't look up from where she was sorting through some papers and records by the register. _

"_If something happens, and we get separated, go there and you'll find your way." Peter wanted to ask why in the world they'd get separated— they rarely left the village—but he knew better than to ask. His parents were particular people, and they didn't discuss worrying things with their son. Not that they didn't trust him, but he WAS young at that point, and they thought it was the parent's job to worry, not the child's, and they probably wouldn't see any different as long as Peter lived, even when he was grown and moved out. _

_Unfortunately, he never got that chance. _

_He remembered it was near midnight on April 11__th__, 1934 and it was the day after his twelfth birthday. They barely tried to hide it, simply parking in front of their target houses and dragging a bunch of families onto their trucks, the Jaeger's included. Peter's Parents went with their heads held high, and walked onto the truck themselves with the soldiers escorting them with guns from behind. Peter tried to fight, but a soldier knocked him out with the butt of his gun and he blacked out. When he came to, they were on a train with no windows, no seats, and way too many people. Some were from his town, but most were strangers. They didn't talk to anyone. _

_By the time they arrived at their destination, a few children and elderly had died of starvation. Their luggage was taken, and never seen again, and they were forced into lines. When they got to a man in a neatly pressed uniform, he pointed for them to go one way or the other. Peter swore the man had serpent's eyes, clawed hands, and a bluish tint to his scaly skin, but no one else seemed to see his unnatural form. They were all scared of him, but not because of his appearance. His mother shoved him back in line, away from her, and he didn't know why, but kept silent. He and his mother ended up going right, his father went left. _

_Only later did Peter realize going left meant he went straight to the gas chambers. Only later did he know that women with children were sent to the gas chambers immediately too, because they were more concerned for their children than for their work, and the children were too young to do much good. _

_Peter was tall for his age, and hardened with the hunting and labor he and his father did, and could pass for a young teenager despite his real age. That and the fact he looked nothing like his adopted parents so that the soldiers assumed they weren't together, and let him by. _

_All their clothes were taken and they were given filthy, striped, prison clothes that were way too big, had his hair shaved clean off and 343258 tattooed on the inside of his left arm. He had a physical with people he was sure weren't doctors and given shots that made him slightly sick for weeks. That was his first encounter with the 'hospital' there. They took pictures and then dragged the group of them to a big warehouse where they mostly slept on the ground with hundreds of others. They all looked like depressed ghosts._

_Every morning they'd make them kneel in line for hours and hours for roll call, and not once was everyone accounted for. Then they were made to work doing pointless tasks like shoveling rocks or digging holes to put the bodies in, or worse still, being the one to carry the bodies out of the gas chambers after it'd been run, or work the furnaces where many were cremated—some not entirely dead yet, just mostly gone. Peter doubted they felt a thing anyway with the state they were in. _

_The absolute worst was being part of the crew that shoveled the mountains of ashes onto trucks to be taken and dumped in a nearby river or lake. _

_Sometimes they took groups out of the camp to factories where they made weapons as part of an assembly line, or other things to help with the war effort. They'd leave after roll call and not get back until well into the night, where they took roll call again, then let them sleep until they were woken only hours later for more work. _

_It took him three weeks to find his mother again after they were initially separated. _

_They lived there for years before anyone in the outside world knew what a concentration camp was or where those taken in the night go, and they were starved and beaten too many times to count. Long after he'd escaped, Peter learned the camp he was in was one of the first- a sort of trial camp for much larger, more machine-like camps elsewhere. Though his camp was the size of his old village, it was tiny in comparison, and run like a square-wheeled wagon when compared to some of the other massive, well-oiled, killing-machines he'd heard of being built in later years. _

_God only knows how Peter lived so long, lasting years when most died in their first couple months. Too many things happened in such dim memories that Peter skimmed over them, even in his own mind. He was so starved, so weak, so tired, that the months that quickly became years blurred together in his memories. Everything about that time was twisted and blurred, like his mind couldn't get a hold of what had happened. His malnourished, exhausted brain didn't waste energy on forming useless, painful memories. _

_And what he did remember, he tried desperately to forget. _

_However, he did remember the day he woke and his mother had frozen to death in her sleep next to him. _

_She had been ill for weeks, but hid it well, knowing they'd take her to the 'hospital' if they saw she was sick. The hospital meant certain death and everyone knew it. It was turning to the winter months, and with no covering, the same dirty, shabby, thin prison clothes they'd gotten upon arrival that someone else had probably died in, and half-ass shelters, many people froze. _

_It didn't surprise him. _

_He knew his mother would have smacked him silly if he cried in front of the soldiers during roll call that morning, so he knelt motionless with his hands on his head in line for hours while they did roll call, and said nothing when they called his mother's number a few times but couldn't find her. He sat still as they carried all the bodies of those who had died that night out and to the furnaces, knowing his mother was one of them. _

_He was eternally thankful he was not one of those chosen for that task that particular morning. _

_It was strange, the things you were thankful for in a place like that. He was thankful he escaped having to put his mother's body into a furnace, or shovel the ashes that could possibly be her remains, and was actually genuinely happy when they took him out of camp to move sandbags alongside a riverbank. He was truly almost joyful for the monotonous, painful work that took his mind off everything but his exhaustion and physical pain. _

_About six years later, he and around four dozen other boys near the same age were loaded onto a train in the windowless box cars and shipped out. For some reason, the train had to slow and Peter managed to break the lock on the door and get the door open. All the boys in that car jumped. Some fell in a river or into high grass, and he didn't see them get up, but mostly they took off into the woods where they'd fallen, each boy for himself. _

_He lost track of how long he spent running. His father and some men from his village had taught him to hunt and lay traps, so for the first time in god knows how long, he had enough to eat. _

_He didn't get constellations; he was never able to see the pattern of the stars that made shapes. Some of the shapes looked nothing like the pictures they supposedly represented. Instead, when he was little, he named the brightest stars in the sky, and one in particular he'd named Bluebell, for its bluish tint. His mother had once told him to follow it, and he did. _

_He reached a small port town, crawling with soldiers, but somehow managed to hide in the cargo bay of a small boat with guns on the top. He'd stockpiled food he'd caught and dried, so he could eat, and managed to stay unseen its entire voyage. _

_At the end, when they finally docked, he slipped out and ran. It wasn't long before he realized he was in Britain, and for some reason, he felt more unsafe here than he had in Germany. _

_It took some long months of surviving and a lot of practice with his English, but he managed to go from port to port until he ended up in America. He wasn't so sure on the geography of any of the places he'd been, but it was a remote little port, and the locals were obviously accustomed to foreigners coming and going, and even though he was German, his English was decent enough that no one cared to notice him. He found work at a mill and a new life in that town for nearly a year. He could walk through the market to buy food like a civilized person and people's eyes would slide by him casually, and the stand owners would sell him things like they would any other person. He actually became a local, knowing and becoming friends with a few, a good acquaintance of many. _

_Soon though, eight years after the first signs of trouble in Peter's small town in Germany, the first signs of trouble in that small town in America appeared. The papers had big headlines about an attack on Pearl Harbor, a place on an island thousands of miles away. People started to get upset, and even amongst the locals that had accepted him for nearly a year, Peter started to get treated like an outcast, like a threat. _

_He took that as his cue to leave, and hitch-hiked south for a few weeks until he hit a city, and that city happened to be Washington D.C., the capital of the free world. He knew he probably wasn't safe there either, this city in particular being more involved in the war than most, but the idea of being in a place built on the concept of being free to be who you are and make your own path in life intrigued him, and he stayed. Temporarily at first, but it turned out to be longer. _

_He'd saved enough money in his time at the mill to pay for a room at the small hotel where he'd later discover Nico and Bianca stayed as well. They were only there temporarily though, like him, and were moving on soon too, after the months of break for Peter, hiding from Zeus for them. Where they were going? They didn't tell Peter exactly, though they hinted at Italy at times. He had a feeling even they didn't know for sure. _

"_Dad wants us in the Underworld, with him." Bianca had explained. "But mom had some bad experiences there, and she won't allow it. He is a god though, so I don't know if he's gonna make her or what." She sighed, holding Nico, who'd fallen asleep on the couch in the hotel lounge. Her mother was out, and it was late, but no one—except for Nico—could sleep. _

"_So you've been to the Underworld?" Peter clarified. That seemed… cool and disturbing all in one. _

"_Yes, we were both born there." Peter raised his eyebrows. He didn't know what he thought of that: new life being created in the Underworld of all places. Guess these things had to happen eventually, what, with statistics and all that. "We used to visit all the time. When Persephone wasn't home, in the summer and spring, we stay a lot longer. Things are pretty uncomfortable when both she and mom are home…"_

_**Gee, I wonder why?**__ Peter thought sarcastically. It was fall now, so no wonder Ms. Di Angelo didn't want to go to the Underworld: the girlfriend hanging out in the same place as the wife was pretty awkward. _

"_Plus… Nico's powers are starting to develop more." Bianca looked stressed about this. "Dad doesn't even know… and we're afraid to tell him. We think he's gonna take him to the Underworld to train… and in all honesty that would probably be the best, the safest for him, but…" She trailed off. _

"_Why would he take him?"_

"_Because Dad thinks one of his kids is meant to do something important one day… he wants us prepared. There's a prophecy or something…" They'd explained all about the prophecies and the oracle, but Peter had a hard time comprehending that. "Currently, he thinks it will be me. I'm the oldest, I fit the 'qualifications' or whatever that the prophecy outlined… but Nico might fit it too, and if Dad sees how advanced he's becoming, he might change his mind."_

"_Do you want it to be you?" Peter didn't think Hades' plans were necessarily good things. _

"_No. Not really. I don't know what it is, and that scares me, but I don't want that to be put on Nico's head either. I'm really just terrified he's gonna take him away." She sighed, pulling the sleeping boy closer. "He let mom take us up here because she begged him… but Zeus is angry with our family, and I think he's out to get us. Life on the surface world is just getting more and more dangerous, and I'm mainly scared mom or Nico is gonna get caught in the crossfire. I don't know if Dad will force all of us to the Underworld, but I could see him taking whoever he thinks will fit his prophecy, whether mom likes it or not." _

"_He wants to protect you." Peter said logically. His parents—any parent he's had so far really—had been cold and distant, but kind and caring as well. Hades seemed a lot like that: very logical and cold, but that didn't mean he didn't care. Somewhere in his icy heart, he cared._

_He couldn't place the same logic on the idea of Apollo though. _

_Peter was brought back to reality in present day when Nico jumped on the couch he was currently occupying, and leapt right over him as he ran from his big sister. _

"_Nico! Non saltare sui mobili!" Bianca scolded him for jumping on the furniture. Peter couldn't help but admire the kid's athleticism. He didn't even break stride as he hit the hardwood floor and full out sprinted away. Bianca looked wiped from her chase, but was laughing along with him. _

_The peaceful, happy air of the room was suddenly broken. _

"_NO!" A voice that chilled him to the bone roared in his ears, and the whole building shook. At the same time, everything flashed white. He felt something heavy and unmovable hit him on the head, forcing his entire body down, but before he was crushed into the ground, everything went black. _


	3. May 25th, 2015

Cameron woke with a start.

_Damn dreams…_ He grumbled internally. He glanced at his bedside table and the digital clock read 3:09 back at him.

Great, he had school tomorrow, and he was up at three am. Well, school today technically.

He collapsed back against his pillow, rubbing his eyes tiredly. He'd never be able to go back to sleep, he never was. Every time he had one of those dreams, he was up for the day, and half the next night as well. Then, when his body was too tired to dream, he'd collapse into a dreamless sleep and finally get some rest. But then, once he was somewhat recuperated, he'd have another dream, and it'd start all over again.

He honestly felt like beating his brain out against the wall or something, because at this point, a concussion induced sleep was better than nothing.

He didn't know how long he'd been having these dreams, but it was as long as he could remember. His current foster parents had only known him a couple months or so, and they were hardly the friendliest, most concerned people on the planet, so they couldn't tell him anything about his dreams.

It was like he was Cameron during the day, the average foster kid attending an average school in no-where Pennsylvania, but then at night, he was Peter, the run-away German demigod in the middle of world war 2.

Never once had he had a dream that didn't involve Peter. Never once did he wake and not have to remind himself he lived in the 21st century and the war ended seventy years ago. Never once was he able to control the way his dreams went, because they didn't _feel_ like dreams.

They felt like memories.

When he was Peter, he felt like that world was real. And then he woke and this world felt real too. He was so confused which was reality and which was in his head.

They were two boys named Pete at his school, and every time someone called them, Cameron would look up. When he thought about his real parents, to which he knew nothing about, his mind always drifted to the Jaegers, or Apollo. When his family went to church on Sunday's he couldn't help but sit there and think about the Greek Gods. But worst was when they learned about World War 2 in class, Cameron had to physically bit down on his tongue to stop from pointing out it didn't happen like that.

What did he know, really? He knew only what he dreamed, and that wasn't fact.

But it felt like it.

Cameron groaned tiredly at his confusion and rolled out of bed in defeat. He couldn't sleep, might as well get up.

He grabbed some clothes and slipped down the hall to the bathroom. He took a long shower, trying to shake the dream away, trying to come back to the present, but being unable to.

He never was. His mind was still caught up in 1942.

He finally gave up and got dressed. When he was brushing his teeth, he accidently looked in the mirror.

He always tried to avoid mirrors, because they always made his heart jump frantically. His eyes were a bluish, greenish, brown-yellow color, like they couldn't make up their mind on what color they wanted to be and settled for an ugly muddy mixture of all of them. His hair was the color of solid tree bark, but there were tiny streaks of gray near his temples. They were hard to see, but Cameron had enough people pointing them out to make it hard to ignore. At twelve, he was already turning gray, and that terrified him too.

But what scared him the most was that it was a stranger's face. When he looked in the mirror, he fully expected to see pale blue eyes and sandy blonde hair looking back at him. He expected to see 343258 tattooed on his arm when he pushed up his sleeve. He felt offended when people called him a kid, and he knew he was only twelve, but he still felt nineteen; he had nineteen years or so of memories through his dreams, but he didn't know how that was possible. He felt nervous going to school and standing there for roll call, because he fully expected people to start walking by with dead bodies when they were done. He woke screaming the night after his twelfth birthday, thinking the men were going to take him away again.

Cameron.

Even the name felt wrong. It felt like a lie; like a front for who he really was.

His name was Peter, wasn't it? Peter Jaeger. Mathilde and Joseph Jaeger were his parents. Nico and Bianca di Angelo explained Apollo was his father. They were children of Hades, their mother's name was Maria.

Little things like that, like the names and the faces that were so clear in Cameron's mind that it made him doubt they were dreams. But the Greek Gods? He had no proof of any of that. A monster never came after him, he was never 'claimed' or even given a hint that his dreams could be real. All he had was this confusion on weather his name was Peter or Cameron, on if the date was 1942 or 2015, on if the world he was currently awake in was a dream or real life.

Somehow, in amidst his usual daily fretting, he got ready for school and slipped out onto the dark and quiet streets. He could wait for the bus, or walk and get to school the same time the bus would make it to his house. Despite his distracted morning routine eating up some time, he was still really early. He let his mind go blank as he walked through empty streets in the sleepy town.

This town really was quite beautiful. It was a quaint, touristy type place, with very uppity people and cutesy shops that sold overpriced knick-knacks and fancy hats. The school district was good; the people all generally knew or had heard of each other, and it went at the sort of slow pace where the fight on school grounds last week had been the headline of the local paper for three days. Cameron was one of the only kids he knew that read the papers. He wasn't into cell phones or social networking; that whole idea freaked him out.

He got to the school half an hour before it opened and took a seat on the front steps. He could see spending his life here, going to this school, and then the high school, and then off to some college… he didn't know what he wanted to be. He could be a doctor, he was really into that kind of stuff—the healing and such- and was pretty smart, but he just couldn't see it. He always pictured herbs, homemade remedies, and almost magic-like healing methods, not needles and machines and blades, the kind used by today's doctors. He really liked clocks as well, like his dream parents had, and from his dreams he knew all about how they worked (It sort of freaked him out that the _real_ inside of a clock had been the exact same as he'd seen it in his dreams, but it did come in handy at times). In his dreams, he'd been set to take his parent's shop once they were too old, so he knew all about that. But businesses had to be different now from what they were in the 1940's, in _Germany_ much less. More paperwork and titles and employees and stuff. More complicated. Everything was more complicated.

A janitor came up and unlocked the front school doors. He didn't seem surprised to see Cameron there, for he was there almost every other day.

As he wandered the school hallways, he thought about his future. So he went to college and got some job, what then? Would he find someone he loved and build a family? Would he find a career he could work endlessly for? Would he forget his dreams about Peter, and finally feel like he was Cameron, a regular present-day boy, rather than Peter, an old time war-torn dream thrown into a peaceful modern day town?

Peaceful was a frame of mind though. This town was peaceful in that nothing ever happened here, but it wasn't entirely stress-free. He still knew about the wars on the other side of the world, about starving children in Africa, about overpopulation and pollution and death everywhere. In southern Germany in the early twentieth century, he never knew any of that. He was isolated in a beautiful village and lived so simply it was a day-to-day process of thinking about life. He knew so much more today, thanks to the internet and communication, but it didn't make him at all happier or more relaxed. As Peter, he didn't go to school; he learned his trade from his parents. He didn't learn about the world, only about clocks and hunting. Sometimes he learned to cook and mend clothes or to scrub the floors and windows from his mother. He learned to fix the roof, chop wood, and skin a rabbit from his dad. He learned survival, not algebra and grammar. Who cares if he put the comma in the right spot if he could communicate well enough to sell clocks and buy dinner at the market?

Oh, English was really something else for him. It turned out he dreaded it more than anything. Not only did the words float off the page like they were trying to escape, but once he figured out what they said, they still didn't make any sense. He could speak English moderately well (he still sounded illiterate at times) but he was best at German.

No one knows where he learned it, everyone assumes it was a foster parent when he was young or something, but so far as he knew, none of his old care-takers had ever spoken German.

He was ok at German grammar, preferring to speak it rather than write it out. Even in his dreams he never had to write anything but little marks in a book about how many clocks they sold that day. He spoke naturally, and even though he had trouble with spelling and grammar and essays, it was a thousand times easier than English. In fact, even though he'd lived in America his whole life, most other kids called him the German exchange student. The teachers knew that wasn't true, but treated him as such anyway. They put him in super-basic remedial English classes but honors German courses.

"Why so serious?" A mock-grave voice said. Cameron jumped and spun on his heel until he was facing his friend, Samuel.

Sam was a lot shorter than him, with curly dark hair and thick eyebrows, but a wicked grin on his face coupled with bright, pale, sky-blue eyes. He walked funny at times, but insisted it was nothing. Cameron had the impression he was embarrassed of his legs because he wore long pants during gym and changed in the showers.

"Have you ever known me not to be serious?" Cameron smiled tiredly, and Sam raised an eyebrow.

"Uh, no, it's from a movie… oh, whatever, you've probably never seen it." He rolled his eyes. "You probably sat and listened to music somewhere, or better yet, wandered around town for three hours instead of doing something with your night!" He said, sarcastically bright.

"And you saw a movie without forcing me to go too?" He countered, sarcastically as well. "When do you ever do anything without me?" Sam pursed his lips in defeat.

"Touché… well, I saw it on TV last night. It was good, you should look it up!"

"You know I don't like movies." Sam gave him an exasperated look.

"Or TV, or computers, or technology in general. Seriously, what's wrong with you?" He joked, but Cameron couldn't help but wonder that as well. When he didn't answer, Sam looked concerned. "Did you have another dream?" Cameron did tell Sam about his dreams, but never said what they were about. He had a feeling even Sam would be freaked by it. He liked to confide in him with most things, because Sam had this way of never doubting what Cameron said, even if it sounded crazy. He believed his dreams meant something too, but Cameron was too afraid to explain farther, half hoping he could pretend they didn't happen and force himself to live a normal life in the present.

"Yeah, when don't I?" He said tiredly.

"And you're still not going to say what they're about?" Sam insisted.

"No. It's just… they feel real. I feel like they're reality and this is the dream."He waved his hand at the stark walls of the school. Sam looked really worried, but Cameron decided to ignore that. He'd said this before, countless times in the months he'd been in this town, and Sam never got over being worried about it. Cameron didn't know how to respond to such worry, so he just ignored it.

The first bell rang and the friends parted ways to go to their own classes. His first class was German, and that brightened his mood considerably.

"Guten Tag!" The teacher said as they filed in. "Wie geht's?" She asked them, meaning 'how are you?'.

"Gut, und du?" They responded in a monotone automatically. Technically, they said 'good, and how are you?' but Cameron knew using that form meant they were talking to a fellow student. It was insulting to a teacher because you should use a more formal form of the word 'you' to show her respect.

"Gut, und Ihnen?" He said and she beamed. She was never insulted by her kids when they used the incorrect form, knowing they were still learning, but she was forever pleased by Cameron's aptitude.

Class began as normal and a girl sat down across from him. He thought her name was Lania or something, for when she first introduced herself, she mumbled. Cameron couldn't quite hear her, so he thought her name was Lania, but was too afraid to ask it now. After all, you sit across from someone for five months and still not know their name? Awkward….

Lania was really pretty, with long red-brown hair that fell to her waist. She had sea-foam green eyes set into a pale face. She didn't talk a lot, just smiled at strange times. He never saw her take any notes, nor did she ever seem to take a test when everyone else was, but somehow she was still in the class. The teacher never called on her, and she always worked alone during partner assignments, even when the teacher said that wasn't an option. It was like she wasn't even part of the class.

Come to think of it, he'd never even seen her outside this class, or ever heard anyone talk about her, apart from once or twice when he saw her in the lunch room. Even stranger, he could have sworn she'd been staring at him. The he blinked and she'd vanished.

She did that a lot: just stare at him. And then he'd think he'd caught her and the next instant she was looking out the window or not even there. He felt like he was losing his mind… or, at least more than usual.

He didn't know if he wanted her to be staring at him or not. Did she like him? He had no experience with girls and wasn't really interested in trying, especially not at twelve years old. His mind felt like that of a twenty-year-old, and with that said, he thought was way too young to even consider that sort of thing.

On the other hand, that meant he just had to believe he'd imagined her staring at him.

The morning classes went by quickly as Cameron's mind wandered away from the present. He began thinking about that small village in southern Germany…

"Dude. Earth to Cameron!" Sam was snapping his fingers in front of his face, getting him to come back to the lunchroom they were sitting in.

"W-what?" He stumbled, coming back to their conversation. He didn't want to say 'coming back to reality' because in all honesty, he felt like he wasn't really here.

"You were zoned out again." Sam sighed. "I was _saying,_ do you have the English homework?"

Cameron gritted his teeth. "Yeah, possibly. I'm sure none of its right though."

"Dyslexia again?" Sam looked sympathetic and understanding.

"Yeah, but it's not just that. It's English in general! Stupid silent K's and H's and E's… what's the point of all that?" Sam rolled his eyes.

"Oh, and German is so much easier?"

"Yes!" Cameron exploded. "I don't know, it's… _logical_ or something. When I wrote that creative essay for English last night, it came out half in German! I had to put it into a translator thing on the computer to get it into English again!" Sam looked worried again.

"And you're sure you never had German foster parents?"

Cameron huffed in frustration. "Yes, I'm sure! Gods, how many times have we been over this?!" He snapped. He was too tired for this. Sam looked stunned, but it couldn't be at Cameron's outburst. He tended to do that a lot these days, snap for no reason, and it never fazed his companion before.

"What did you say?" He looked completely floored.

"Nothing, just that we've been over this _so_ many times, it's like beating a dead horse with all you're incessant worrying and-"

"No, about the Gods." Sam looked more scared than he'd ever seen him before.

Oops, Cameron hadn't meant to say that. With his dreams, he'd thought a lot about the Greek gods and sometimes, when he wasn't paying attention, and the lines between Cameron and Peter got blurred, he'd let slip something that Peter would say. Peter believed in the Greek gods, because Nico and Bianca had explained that and proved it to him. What did Cameron believe? He didn't know, and it was easier just to go with what his dream-self believed. That part of him felt more like reality than whatever life he was living here.

"It's nothing!" Cameron snapped, not liking that this conversation was getting too close for comfort. "Just… forget it." He grabbed his half eaten lunch and tossed it in the trash and practically ran from the lunch room.

What was happening?

He had to remind himself his name was Cameron. He chanted it to himself in his head when he woke up in the morning. Sometimes he wrote Peter on the top of his worksheets in class and had to assure everyone he had just made a mistake when the teachers got confused.

He _knew_ he was Peter. He didn't know how, but his name was Peter Jaeger, and that wouldn't change. Perhaps he died in that hotel, and this was his second life. He remembered almost everything from being Cameron except really early memories from being a baby, when his infant brain didn't collect any memories. Every school and new home and day where he woke up and brushed his teeth, and every mundane detail in life, he remembered all that, but at the same time, he remembered waking up as a child in southern Germany.

He remembered small details about life in Germany that people shouldn't just dream about. He remembered the color of the sky on his seventh birthday, the smell of the wheat fields after it thunder stormed for five days strait, the pain of the many splinters he'd gotten working with wooden clocks, the sharp sensation of falling and getting small pebbles stuck in his knees, the taste of dark bread and raspberries with fresh milk that he had for breakfast every morning growing up… in Germany.

He was allergic to raspberries, and only had them once when he was very small to figure that out. How did he know with so much certainty what the fresh fruit tasted like? How did he remember picking those little seeds from his teeth all morning? How did he know not to eat them while wearing his good white shirt because the juice stained it? How did he know that they grew on a line of bushes in front of the forest behind his little store? How could he picture that town, the buildings, the layout, and the people so clearly? If it was all a dream, why was it all so clear, and why did it feel more real that the ground he was standing on, than the school hallway he was staring down at this very moment.

At three years old—his earliest memory as Cameron—he remembered riding in a car and watching a city skyline pass by. He had been terrified because he'd never seen buildings so tall or streets so crowded and foreign, because he remembered the small town he'd grown up in. He felt as old and weathered as a war survivor at three years old.

They said around that time, he'd started speaking German. Fluent German, like an adult, and no one could explain it. He'd asked questions about wars and Italy and Greek history that no one knew the answers to off the top of their heads, or how on earth a three year old could ask such things.

He clearly remembered asking those questions, and the adult's perplexed expressions when he asked them. His memories picked up from 19 year old Peter in the collapsing hotel, to three year old Cameron in the car, with one gigantic gap he couldn't remember happening. It was like there _was_ no gap, like it'd been seconds later and he was in a car, but there _had_ to have been.

Forget settling down, he had to figure this out if it killed him. Because he wouldn't grow out of it, he wouldn't forget Peter like a childhood dream. He WAS Peter, he just had to figure out how that was possible.

"Cameron." A girl's voice called. It took him a moment to come out of his thoughts and realize they were calling to him, and another to know he didn't recognize the voice. He turned and saw Lania standing in the empty hallway he'd run off into. She had a mesmerizing voice, and he wanted to listen to it and wanted to stare into her alarming eyes. He couldn't blink, so he kept staring. At the same time, something about her made him want to run in the opposite direction. But why? It wasn't like she'd hurt him, she was just a classmate.

"Don't be afraid," She reassured him. "It will be painless, this second death, I promise." Suddenly, his senses were on red alert, but he still couldn't move. What did she mean by that? Second death? Did that mean Peter was real? Peter was a past life?

He probably should have been more focused on the fact she was promising him death rather than the first half of her statement, but it was what he had wanted to hear for a long time, what he's just resolved to investigate, and his hopes started to rise. Talk about instant gratification.

She walked up to him, but as she did, she changed. Her gait became like she was swaying her hips in an over exaggeration, but then he realized her legs had morphed into a giant serpent's tail that slithered back and forth across the stark tile. She still wore a light blue t-shirt over a human top half, her face still as beautiful as ever, but she looked more like a woman than a twelve year old girl. Her stunning eyes had changed as well, her pupils had changed shape so they were slits, like a serpent's, rather than round like a human's.

"I've waited too long for you to reveal yourself." She smirked, her voice still enchanting him to be frozen, and he saw her teeth were sharp with deadly looking front fangs, her tongue forked.

"Lamia." Cameron managed to choke out. The snake-woman looked startled, and backed up a foot or two.

"Names have power you know… how did you know mine without so much as a hint?" She smiled coyly as if this was entertainment before she enjoyed her dinner.

Cameron had done a lot of research into Greek Mythology. Three guesses why.

Lamia was a monster who ate bad children in the myths. His research had said parents used to threaten their children with her to make them behave, but he's always suspected it was something more with what he remembered of Bianca explaining that most monsters were real and went after demigods once they revealed themselves. It also said Zeus gave her the ability to take her eyes out because he felt guilty for all her children dying and her strange habit to eat others in retribution, though no one was really sure why he felt guilty or how that gift would be helpful.

He didn't answer her and she looked disappointed. "I thought you would be more fun that thissssssss," She seemed to laugh at her own hissing pun. "I've been watching you and your little goat friend for monthssss, waiting for you to sssslip up, and finally, it's happened!" She seemed overjoyed and her eyes bugged out a little. Cameron felt wigged out, suddenly having a pretty good idea how she'd been watching them.

"Goat friend?" He wondered aloud, and she laughed cruelly.

"Oi! Back off slimy!" Cameron's heart thudded when he recognized Sam's 'angry voice'. It kind of reminded him of an irritated hamster at times, and usually he found it funny, but right now he didn't think he wanted Sam getting up close and personal with Lamia. He was so small, Cameron was pretty sure Lamia could swallow his little friend whole.

He was pretty impressed though when a shoe collided with the back of the snake-lady's head with some decent force and she broke eye contact with Cameron. Suddenly he was free, the enchantment broken with her eye contact, and he immediately began backing up away from her.

"What the-!" She shrieked as another shoe hit her square in the face as she turned to look at the newcomer. Sam went flying past her as she was distracted by the second hit and screeched to a halt next to Cameron.

"Sup bro?" He said conversationally, as if this happened a lot. Cameron couldn't help but notice without his shoes, he had hooves.

"Dude…" He gaped, completely messed up now.

"Here," Sam tossed him a sword he apparently whipped out from nowhere. It was thin as a roll of dimes with a guard the size of a playing card, and only the length of his arm, but it was made out of a material he'd never seen before. A sort of iridescent bronze and it sung with a kind of energy in his hand.

"What the Hades am I supposed to do with this!?" Cameron hollered as Lamia regained herself and began advancing quickly on the boys. They both backed up quickly down the hall, still facing her.

"Fight, dumbbell! What else do you do with a sword?!" Sam yelped at Lamia slashed out with her tail and he dove out of the way. Cameron had never fought anyone in either of his lives. Sure, he'd gotten beaten up, but he didn't know how you were supposed to go after someone like you had the intent to hurt them.

He let his instincts take over though, and he lunged.

Lamia managed to deflect it with her scaly tail, and the sword went flying. Apparently he didn't know how to even hold a sword either. Her tail came back down and hit him square in the chest. He went sailing down the hall, and skidded a good dozen feet after hitting the ground.

"Cursed demigod! I'll get you and that stupid goat for this!" She screamed and slithered down the hallway at lightning speed.

Demigods. Apollo. _Archery._

Cameron's thoughts went faster now that the shock of finding out his dreams could possibly be real was finally wearing off. A monster from Greek mythology was attacking him and his best friend was a satyr, that was more than enough proof that the Greek world existed and his dreams—at least the Greek gods and demigod part—could be true. He didn't know if Apollo was still his father in this life, but he was going to bank on it anyway.

But he was in a school, how was he supposed to find a bow and arrow?

He turned and took off down the hall. "Come on!" He yelled and Sam was right on his heels, his hooves clopping against the white tile. Lamia was right behind them.

He quickly mapped it out in his head and took the next left they came to. "Orchestra room, go!" He commanded, and Sam looked alarmed but forked off in a hallway to their right as Cameron went strait. Lamia followed him, as he'd hoped.

He went the longest way possibly, sprinting by classrooms too fast to see if any teachers were coming out to scold him for running in the halls. It was in the middle of a class, so there were only a few kids out in the hallways but Lamia knocked them down in rage as she passed, and they seemed dazed as if they didn't realize a giant snake lady had just passed them. Cameron ran faster than he remembered ever doing before and he actually gained a lot of ground on the monster chasing him. He managed to do a loop around the school and return to where they'd first faced her, and he spotted the sword lying where it's been thrown. He scooped it up as he ran, then made his way to where Sam was.

He got to the orchestra room and Sam was there waiting. He flung open the door as Cameron dove inside, before he shut it immediately, quickly locking it. It was of thick wood with no windows, but they didn't need to see when it began rattling off its hinges and the yells of Lamia combined with her tail thrashing against the door, her nails scrapping across it, filled the small room.

"The orchestra room, excellent! One of the only rooms in the building with no windows and only one door! Just perfect!" Sam said sarcastically, but also slightly hysterically, like he was scared but trying to hide it.

"Hey, you're the one who didn't tell me you were a satyr!" Cameron snapped, moving amongst the instruments in the room. Sam's jaw dropped.

"How did you-?"

"Not important at the moment!" Cameron yelled in a panic as the wood began to crack on the door. That must be one strong lock. "Focus!" He hollered at his friend who threw up his hands.

"On what!? What's the plan!?"

Truthfully, Cameron was praying this worked, but the logical, German side of him said it was pointless. Nevertheless, he found a cello leaning up in its stand. He undid the en-pin—the sharp point that stuck into the ground when playing it—and pulled it out all the way. He said a silent apology to the school before roughly ripping it out. The bottom of the wooden instrument splintered as the metal pole came out, and he let the now broken instrument drop with a musical clatter before moving to the harp in the corner.

"Help me," He said, and Sam helped him push it to the middle of the room.

"What…" Sam thought better of asking what he was thinking and just moved in preparation to fight when Lamia got through by picking up a music stand and holding it like he was preparing to throw it.

Cameron loosened one of the bigger strings on the massive instrument and fitted the sharp endpin into it like an arrow, pulling back with all his might until he feared the thin metal string would break. He tested the angling to make sure he could aim, if only just barely. It was far from perfect, and so many things could have go wrong, but he prayed he was right.

_Please, Apollo…_ He prayed harder than he ever had before. _Let this work… I don't know if you're still my dad in this life, but PLEASE may this work…_

Lamia burst through the door in triumph and Cameron released his make shift arrow, some of the harp strings snapping under the stress, as Sam threw his stand. His body moved of it's own accord as he watched the metal pole go right through Lamia's forehead. It didn't do much, just passed right through her, but he didn't expect it to kill her. He remembered Nico saying only celestial bronze could kill monsters, and he assumed that was what the sword was.

He didn't want the pin to kill her, only stun her, make her halt before instantly charging the ten feet from the center of the tiny room to where they stood, like snakes did instinctually, and it did just that. She seemed surprised to no end that something just went right through her head, and Cameron could imagine how weird that must feel. She stumbled as the stand hit her as well, but she wasn't distracted for long. By the time she'd collected herself, he'd managed to close the gap between them and lunge with the sword grasped firmly in both hands this time. He was terrified he'd drop it again, and it was far from a comfortable or easy grip, but it did the job. The sword plunged into her gut, and her eyes went wide in surprise, and then she exploded into a cloud of golden dust.

There was a moment of silence when everything went from loud and rushed to perfectly still yet again. Cameron said a silent thank you to Apollo. There was no way that would have worked without his help.

"Ok, WHAT the HADES just happened!?" Sam exploded, rounding on Cameron. "HOW did you know all that!? I'M supposed to be explaining this to YOU, so WHY do I feel like_** I**_ need the explanation!?"

The bell rang and people started changing classes. Crowds of kids began to form out in the halls.

"I think we need to get out of here before they see what we've done to their room." Cameron pointed out, grabbing Sam by the arm and dragging him out in the hall. He didn't go back to class; he went right to the nearest exit and slipped out. Sam seemed to finally see sense and was running willingly now. It wouldn't be long before security realizes someone was using the side door to cut school, so they sprinted away into the streets of town.

Sam took charge and led them through back roads until they reached the town's only train station.

"We're leaving town? All we did was mess up a music room, and no one's gonna catch us now. I don't think we're wanted criminals or anything." Cameron said as Sam stopped to buy tickets at a machine.

Sam gave him a funny look. "You were just chased and attacked by a demon snake-lady who's been in your class for months disguised as a girl, and you're perfectly fine staying here and going to school tomorrow like nothing ever happened?" He asked critically. Cameron thought it over.

"Uh, yeah. I guess I am." He confessed, and Sam just rolled his eyes in exasperation at his friend.

"Well, now that they've found you, monsters are gonna start flooding this town looking for you, so I think the best option is to get you out of here and somewhere safe. You were lucky once, let's not bank on that for the rest of your life, shall we? Come on." He grabbed the tickets and ran through the train station until they found the right train. Luckily it was midday so there wasn't a lot of people around to notice Sam's hooves clopping noisily against the concrete. Cameron tried to argue and talk it out as Sam attempted to get him on the train.

"Uh-uh! You're coming with me! As you pointed out, I'm a satyr, and it's my job to get you somewhere safe, so move your ass! Plus, you're my friend and it would really put a damper on our relationship if you got us eaten by a monster! They'll be headed here any minute, and we need to get a move on!" He finally managed to drag him onto the train and pulled him to the nearest car and to seats right by the door, facing it to watch for anyone else boarding after them.

"And they're after me because I'm a demigod?" He confirmed, and Sam glanced around the car to make sure it was empty. It was, so he nodded. "And I'm supposed to just up and leave everything here and go off to some camp and train to fight them?" Sam froze and his eyes went wide.

"I never said anything about camp…and come to think of it, I never said anything about demigods either, how did you…?"

"My dreams." Cameron was nearly in tears. He was so happy it was all true, or at least part of it. He didn't know if Peter was real yet, but the things Peter had learned were all true, and that was the best news he'd ever heard.

"Your dreams told you all about this?" Sam looked amazed.

"Sort of… I just, I knew about the Greek gods being real and the monsters and celestial bronze, and the camp up north where I will learn to fight. I did a bunch of research on my own after that, and learned the details of just about everything else. It was how I knew about Lamia, and Apollo, and satyrs."

"And how you said 'gods' at lunch… and then later you said 'what the Hades'… those are trademark demigod things. I… I should have seen it sooner." Sam put together. Cameron couldn't stop smiling. This was happening, this was _really_ happening. For the first time he felt like he was really living in the present, like that fight had shocked him back to life. The train started to move, and they took off.

"Where are we going? North, right?" Cameron asked happily. Sam nodded.

"New York City; Camp Half Blood is a bit outside it. We can get there by taxi if no other monsters catch up with us." He pulled out the sword they'd used earlier. It seemed to be collapsible, like a presentation pointer. "You were crap with this. When you stabbed her…ha! I've never seen a more inept grip in my life." He joked and Cameron rolled his eyes.

"I'm a son of Apollo, I think I'm more archery bound." He smiled gleefully, but froze when Sam looked shocked again.

"You don't know your real parents, and no one's given you any indication the Greek gods were real until an hour ago. How could you_ possibly _know you're the son of Apollo?" He demanded.

"Oh, well… I guess it could be anyone now, but before…" How should he put this?

"Before what?" Sam said sharply. Cameron looked at his friend sadly.

"I… is it possible for a demigod to live more than one life? Like, die and then come back for a second life?" Sam seemed startled and wary at that question.

"Uh… yeah, I guess. When a demigod dies, they get sorted into Elysium—which is like reward-, Asphodel—which is for those who do nothing meaningful in their lives-, or Punishment, which is self-explanatory. If a hero reaches Elysium, they have the option of coming back for another life. If they reach Elysium three times, they get to go to the Isle of the Blessed which is like the epitome of reward."

This was too good to be true: did that mean Peter reached Elysium and came back as Cameron now? That would explain everything.

"Is it possible this is my second life?" Cameron asked, desperately wanting it to be true. Sam looked terrified.

"Well, uh, I guess, I mean, it's not out of the question. But we'd never know, because all souls that choose to come back have to bath in the River of Lethe. It wipes your memories completely and makes you a new born again for your next life."

Cameron's heart dropped.

"I… I think something happened…" Cameron began the story of his dreams in a daze. He just went from being really happy that this was all explained, to terrified he was a mistake. What would happen now? Would they recall him or something, like a defective product? Would they drag him back to the Underworld and force him into the river and do it right this time? His heart began beating wildly.

Sam seemed stunned.

"No freakin wonder you're so cranky! I'd be too!" he sat and thought it all over. "So… you… get confused whether or not you're 'Peter' or 'Cameron'." He nodded confirmation. "And… who do you feel like? I mean if you had the option, who would you rather be? What would you rather people call you?"

Cameron sat back, shocked.

He had a choice?

"Peter." He heard himself say before he really thought it through. "I-I call myself Peter in my head, I have to remind myself I'm Cameron every morning. I was Peter a lot longer than I was Cameron, and it just feels…right." And it was. Calling himself Cameron was like calling himself 343258. Sure, for a long time it had been his name, but that didn't make it him. He was happiest when he was Peter, and he was sure the experiences that forged who Peter was as a person were a lot stronger than anything that ever happened to Cameron.

"Why do you do that?" Sam asked, pointing to where he was clutching his forearm. He hadn't even realized he was doing it. "You do it when you space out sometimes."

"I was just… remembering."

"Life before?" Sam asked, unsure, and Peter nodded.

"I… I had a tattoo here," he pushed up his sleeve and pointed to the smooth, unmarked skin there, three inches above the inside of his wrist. There was nothing there now, but he could almost feel the needles where the ink was injected into him. "It feels weird… I thought it would brand me for life, and here I am… without it." It did feel weird. He had that tattoo as a reminder- a painful one- of his past, and it _was_ always there, even if not physically.

"What was it?" Sam asked curiously.

"343258." He said automatically. He'd gotten used to being addressed as such, and he slipped for a moment back into that mindset. He remembered once in math class as 'Cameron', someone had given an answer that began with 343. He didn't say 'three hundred and forty three', the kid had said 'three, four, three' and Peter had jumped to his feet on instinct. When a soldier called your number, you stood in attention, and for a brief, terrifying moment, even when he was awake and sitting in a school in suburban America, he thought he was back in a desolate camp seventy years ago being yelled at by soldiers for something he didn't do. Everyone's eyes turned to stare at him, and he could only apologize and sit back down. He would have blushed if he hadn't been so preoccupied with the confusion in his own mind.

"Numbers?" Sam asked, bringing him back from his memories. Peter smiled grimly.

"A little souvenir from Hitler." He tried to joke, to make things seem lighter than he felt, but it really wasn't that funny. Sam went pale.

"You were in a concentration camp?"

Peter nodded. "I don't know which one, no one ever knew the official name." Sam looked uncomfortable.

"Did you, uh…"

"Die there?" Peter finished for him. "No. I escaped after a some years and made my way to the U.S, and then I lived here for a few months before ending up in D.C." He thought back. "I met some other demigods there and they explained most of what I know. Something happened to the building we were in, and everything just… went away."

"What do you mean?" Sam didn't seem to know how to comfort him, and was giving up in favor of his curiosity.

"I think the building must have collapsed or something because I felt the ceiling, or something like it, fall… then everything was blurry, and I start having memories of being a kid… as Cameron. One minute something hits me over the head and I feel like I'm being crushed, and seemingly seconds later I'm sitting in a car as a three year old. And now I'm here. You know my life as Cameron, there isn't anything I've hidden from that part of me." And it was true, he'd told Sam everything.

He was lucky; he never had any issues with foster parents or children's homes. He was never abused or treated badly, or put in a bad home; he just wasn't easy to place. He was told he just showed up on the steps of an orphanage as a newborn, and lived there for a time before being put into foster care. He averaged a new home a year, but it was only things like the people were too old to keep up with kids anymore, or they withdrew from the foster program when they wanted to adopt a Chinese baby or something. Some people even had a cycle, meaning they took on a new kid every year as a 'project' to teach the kid good morals or something, and then sent them back. Peter never belonged anywhere, and his life was tiring at times, but it wasn't as difficult as he knew it could've been for him. He didn't even think twice about the foster parents he was leaving now, though they'd be mildly concerned, he was sure. They'd report it and the local government would attribute it to another runaway foster kid. His name would go down on some file, but the world would move on without him.

"It collapsed? That's… that just sucks." Sam said earnestly and Peter knew what he meant. It sucked he survived a concentration camp and a war, only to be taken out by a collapsing building. "But… how did you know about being the son of Apollo? If you never got to Camp Half Blood, how…?" He trailed off.

"One of the demigods I met, he just sort of stared at me for a while and then said I was the son of Apollo. No one seemed to doubt him."

"It… that's not possible. Gods claim their kids, or parents knew they were, uh, 'meeting up' with a god when they _had_ said kid: that's the _only_ way anyone could know for certain." Sam frowned. Peter just shrugged.

"Well, Apollo answered my prayer today. Unless he's just a really nice uncle or something, I think that says something. Then again, you might be right… Apollo could've been my father in that past life, who knows who my parents are in this one. I don't even know if my mortal parent is my mom or dad so it really could be anyone. I don't look anything like I used to either, so maybe Apollo isn't my father."

"What did you used to look like?" He wondered aloud, and Peter described himself before.

"What's worse is that I expect _that._ When I look in the mirror, I'm always stunned to see this looking back." He gestured to his face, instinctively looking at his reflection in the window past Sam's head. As always, brown hair and flecked eyes looked back at him. He sighed.

"Do you think… that maybe your appearance, your old appearance, helped when you got to camp?" Sam asked nervously, still unsure if he was completely sold in the idea that his friend was a reincarnation of a past life. He didn't think "Peter" was lying, it was just a lot to take in, and they didn't know for sure yet.

"Yes. In fact I'm sure of it. The prisoners used to have this song for new arrivals… _Blonde hair, blue eyes, live to see tomorrow's skies…_ there was more, but you don't want to hear my singing."

Sam looked sadly at his friend. "I'm sorry. I don't know… I'm just sorry." Peter seemed to know what he meant. He was sorry he went through what he did, even if he wasn't a soul returned for a second life, he was sad these things happened at all in the first place. Everyone felt like that about that time of history. "You seem… really _calm_ for everything that's just happened. For fighting off a monster, and then all of what we just figured out, you seem to be taking it in a lot better than I am." Sam half complained, and Peter grinned, trying to lighten the mood.

"I've _always_ been better at coping than you, Sam, it's not that surprising." Sam laughed.

The trip went by peacefully for the most part. Peter told Sam all about that little town in southern Germany, and Sam began to believe him more and more. What else could leave him with these memories?

"But demigod dreams… they could mean a lot of things. They can predict the future, or key you in to what's happening at the time, or a million other things. What if you're just channeling some other soul's memories?" Sam asked and Peter was brought up short.

"I can't- I just can't think about that." He was suddenly panicked at that thought. "I don't _feel_ like a teenage boy in modern day, I _feel_ like Peter. I feel like a boy who grew up in the 1930's and was thrown into modern day. I just… even if I'm not really Peter, I don't think I'd ever want to be Cameron again." He spat his new name angrily. "It feels like a lie. It feels _wrong. _I honestly don't know what I'd do if it turned out this is all in my head. Probably just go off the deep end or go even crazier than I am now." Sam looked worried at Peter's stress.

"Hey, it's ok… I believe you're Peter, and I think it's gonna turn out ok, I was just thinking through things." He reassured his friends, and Peter relaxed some.

They had to switch trains about an hour outside of New York, and the afternoon was quickly slipping away.

"We're making good time; we might make it well before sundown." Sam considered. "I'm not scared of the dark, but fighting out in the country at night isn't easy, especially not for a newbie." He joked to Peter who smirked. The car wasn't empty on the second train so they couldn't talk quite so openly. "We should make a pit stop though, when we get off."

The second train ride went faster, and before they knew it, they were sliding to a stop at Grand Central Station. Sam had been getting edgier and edgier as the day went on.

"Come on," He tried to walk quickly, but quietly so no one noticed his hooves, to which he still had no shoes to cover. The station was beautiful, arched high up with a big American flag hanging from the ceiling. There were people everywhere but none spared a second glance at the nervous boys. Sam went right over to platform number three and right next to the entrance was a janitor's closet. The door was marked 'employee's only' but the caution sign beneath it had an owl with what looked like a trident emblazoned on its chest.

"I thought Poseidon and Athena hated each other?" He asked, recognizing the two symbols in the strange form.

"What?" Sam asked distractedly, and Peter pointed to the sign, and Sam laughed. "Ha! Oh, they do, trust me they do, that's something else. Two campers you'll meet in due time." He yanked open the door and slipped inside, and Peter followed.

Inside was about thirty times longer than was physically possible. It was a long narrow hallway that simply kept going back at least sixty or seventy feet. There were weapons and supplies lined up against the walls: swords, shields, armor, knives, axes, bows, hundreds of arrows, spare clothes of every size, water bottles, packaged food, sleeping bags, medical supplies, books, and other things Peter didn't recognize, but didn't need to be a genius to figure out were magical items. Some glowed, others were vibrating slightly, some even had eyes that followed him.

"A demigod's one stop shop." Sam gestured to the room. "Some campers thought it'd be a good idea to uh, stock up, in case anything ever happened. It works well enough to keep the city prepared, but also to help out demigods trying to get to camp, and since you still don't have a weapon you're any good at, I thought a quick stop wouldn't hurt."Peter took everything in slowly.

Wow, being a demigod seemed a lot more dangerous than he'd expected.

"Why would they need to stock up? What happened that they weren't prepared for?" Sam shifted uncomfortably.

"We, uh… kind of had a full out war in Manhattan than no one knew about." Somehow, this didn't surprise Peter, thought he _was_ curious. "They weren't UN-prepared so to speak, but… you know, avoiding another war is good, being prepared for another is more realistic. At least that was the thinking of the surviving demigods."

Surviving demigods.

Maybe he would fit in with this crowd better than he'd originally thought. They were all survivors of war in their own way.

"Besides, pretty much all demigods trying to get to Camp Half Blood go to New York City first. Most come through here. Giving them a way to re-stock and prepare for the final stretch is just logical thinking. Uh… don't tell anyone I said that." He rethought his statement.

"And why's that?"

Sam smirked at that question. "Because the guy who came up with this place isn't known for his… _thinking._ And his girlfriend—who's legendary for her brilliance—would probably take offense… and your head."

"Poseidon and Athena." Peter said, pointing at the door. Sam nodded.

"Their children. Legends around camp." Wow, children of Athena and Poseidon dating. He bet Aphrodite got in trouble for that one.

He scanned the walls of weapons, but nothing caught his eye in particular. He didn't know how to fight with any of it. He supposed a shield was a safe bet, but that wouldn't help him _kill_ a monster. He turned out to be decent with a bow—or harp rather—be he didn't know if that was just his plea to Apollo- or if Apollo was up for a repeat- or he himself actually had talent with it.

Sighing internally, he grabbed a collapsible bow and shoved it into a thin, empty backpack, along with a bunch of arrows. He left the shield; thinking if he had to fight, he might as well stop trying to play defensively and get over it already. Sam had found a spare pair of sneakers that looked fitted especially for satyr hooves. Perhaps shoeless satyrs was a common enough problem for them to need to stock up.

With that, they left the storage room/janitor closet and headed for the streets. It took them a minute to find a taxi, none seemed to keen on stopping for two young boys, but finally one did and Sam gave him directions that took them out of the city.

"I'm getting nervous." Sam said unnecessarily. He looked stressed enough to give him permanent worry lines, and had been getting more anxious as they approached camp. "_One_ monster attack… it never happens like that. There are always more… I just hate the suspense…"

"Shouldn't we be glad there are no monsters?" Peter tried to comfort him, but Sam looked exasperated.

"Sure, why not? It's not like we don't get breaks like that _all_ the time!" he snapped sarcastically. "We—demigods, satyrs, people in our world in general—we don't get breaks. Bad things happen on a daily basis outside camp, and we can't change it, all we can do it fight it."

"So we've already had our daily dose of monster! We're good now right?!" Peter said brightly, trying to annoy him now and it worked.

"Ha! You're hilarious." He deadpanned. "I don't like it when things aren't as expected. I don't like simply waiting for a monster to come up and attack us. We're in New York City for gods sake! The center of the Greek world, and no monsters yet? I'm not saying stranger things haven't happened, but I just don't like the suspense…"

The center of the Greek world…. He knew Mt. Olympus was at the Empire State building, but he'd never seen the building itself. The buildings and the streets in this city were unlike anything he'd seen before: massive and crowded. So much life, so much activity… it was exhilarating. Sure, he knew all about New York from research and pictures… but it was like a fairy tale actually being here. Staring out the window now… he really could believe it was another world.

The cab soon left the city- to Peter's slight disappointment- and began making its way down back roads, in less crowded more suburban areas.

"Ten minutes…" Sam kept muttering under his breath.

"Stop it, you're making _me_ anxious." Peter told him and he sighed.

"You should be. Keep your senses up."

"I don't want my senses up, I want to sleep. You say we're close, what are the chances we'll be attacked last minute?"

"Don't say th-!" But whatever Sam was about to scold him for was lost as the taxi was thrown off the road.

It flipped on its roof and immediately all four windows shattered. The cab driver screamed a pretty girly scream for such a big guy and kicked out his door before making off back down the road they'd been on. Peter was about to wonder what scared him when he felt something wrap around his ankles.

He was pulled out of the cab so fast, everything was a blur of colors and he was suddenly hanging upside down fifty feet off the ground, supported by iron clamps around his feet. He twisted around in the air and had to do a double take.

She had dark brown hair and beady eyes, but a blue feathered body and great wings where her arms should be. Instead of legs she had the massive taloned feet of an eagle that were clamped around Peter's ankles, and she laughed a screeching caw at him through a sharp black beak.

"Ha-a-a-ar-r-r-p-ies!" Sam cried. A green harpy had his ankles (or the hooves' equivalent) and he was being shaken back and forth rapidly as she went in rapid little circles, so talking wasn't working well for him.

Peter's harpy laughed/cawed harshly and took off, flying here and there and basically making Peter really dizzy. As he spun through the air he caught sight of at least three other colors against the sky and knew there were more than two harpies to deal with.

His mind slowed down as he considered everything. He thought faster than he could catch up with, and suddenly he was twisting around, unzipping the front pouch of his backpack that was still safely on his back.

"No, no, no!" The harpy chastised him when she saw him slip his bow out. With a snap it un-collapsed to a full size bow and the harpy dived, doubling her efforts to disorient him and make him drop the weapon. Strangely enough, he wasn't disoriented. He took everything in as if he was still holding still. Even though he couldn't see well, everything turning into one big blur, he could sense where everything was at his position in space.

He let the bow slide down his hand until he was only holding its tip. With all the force he could, he did a crunch, pulling himself up and whipped the bow to where he expected the harpy's head to be. With a jolt up his arm and a loud crack it made contact and as her eyes seemed to vibrate in her head, she dropped him.

…dropped him still thirty feet off the ground.

He felt like a cat as he twisted in air, his stomach fluttering in his chest, slipping the bow around his shoulders as he fell and managing to land feet first on the ground. He knew his legs wouldn't handle that collision, and relaxed, not trying to stop it for fear of shattering his shin or thigh bones, and let his legs give out and collapse underneath him as they hit the ground.

His knees made the full contact with the gravel road, absorbing all the impact. Pain shot through him but he gritted his teeth. Blinding agony swept through his knee caps and up his thighs and he wondered at the damage.

_Get up. Just get up, you need to move, now!_ He thought to himself. Something rustled above him and he heaved himself forward to roll out of the way, still not able to stand yet. Talons imbedded themselves into the gravel where he just was. It was a new harpy, this one was blonde and had reddish brown feathers.

The bow was in his hand before he realized he'd moved. Without thinking he reached over his shoulder, undid the second pouch of the pack, and loaded an arrow. He let it fly before he even had a moment to doubt he could do it, or pray to Apollo, or calculate the best place to aim; he just did it on instinct.

The arrow imbedded itself into her chest, right over her heart, and she disappeared into golden dust.

"AHHHHHHHHH!" Sam's scream jolted Peter out of his shock of what he'd just done. He was still being thrown around by his harpy, and the others—six or seven as far as Peter could count at a glance in the fading afternoon sun—were looking angry, their sharp beaks pecking angrily. They were catcalling and taunting, but their words rushed together in Peter's overworked mind.

_Get, up, NOW!_ He commanded himself and he stood. The pain in his legs was unbearable, but somehow, he'd known the feeling before. He couldn't place it, but he had, and he knew he could bare it again. He willed himself to ignore it and keep going.

"Hey!" He called, getting her attention, loading another arrow and sending it straight into the green harpy's forehead. Sam fell through the golden dust towards the ground and Peter darted forward unstably. He wasn't strong enough to catch his friend, but he settled for the satyr landing on him.

"Ooof!" They both grunted as Peter's legs gave out again, and he had to bite down on his tongue until it bled to keep from screaming.

"Oh, that was graceful…" Sam groaned, still sarcastic as ever. His eyes were spinning in his head and it didn't look like he could see he was so dizzy.

"Damn you, filth!" A harpy shrieked. Peter stood, throwing Sam off him and shot the harpy before she could gain another foot towards them. The others howled and swarmed directly above them.

"Come on, up-up!" Peter gripped Sam's arm firmly with his free hand and practically dragged him down the road, the direction the cab had been going. He ran as fast as he could with his damaged knees and dragging his friend along behind him.

"Damn-harpy!" Sam cursed, trying to gain his balance, but he just didn't have the coordination yet. "Up the hill! That pine tr-!"

He was cut off as the harpies dived.

They came all at once and their beaks and claws slashed and cut at anything they could reach. One of their claws raked down Peter's back, going straight through his thin backpack, and this time he couldn't stop the scream that escaped his lips. He felt blood rush down, not just there, but everywhere, as his skin opened up all over, wherever they touched.

"Agh-!" He saw talons sink into the front of Sam's chest and his best friend's cries cut off suddenly with a gurgle, the tips of her talons visibly poking out the back of his shirt and blood pouring out the corners of his mouth.

"NO!" He bellowed, scaring at least two off in surprise, including the one with her talons in his friend, and she released the small satyr as she skittered back. With a rush of energy, he scooped his lifeless friend up, threw him over his shoulder, and took off down the road.

The sun had reached the horizon, and everything had turned a golden yellow color in the evening light. It was strangely beautiful for such a horrific situation.

What hill? What tree? Sam was unconscious, blood pouring out the wounds in his chest and too far gone to help him now. He struggled to run down the road, the harpies circling above, occasionally diving and raking their claws across them, or trying to trip them up. They didn't see much threat of their prey getting away, so they must not have been as close as Sam had thought. They were cackling, enjoying watching him struggle.

"HEY! Bird brains!" A strong voice called, and the harpies were shocked as a sword imbedded itself in one of their chests, and fell to earth as she vanished into dust.

"You need better insults!" Another voice broke through the chaos, only this time it was a girl's.

A boy and girl were running down the road from the direction Peter was trying to go. The boy had dark almost-black hair and vibrant green eyes, visible even from this distance. He seemed to be half laughing at the girl, but not letting his eyes off the harpies. The girl had long blond hair pulled back in a pony tail, a long silver knife looking rather dangerous in her hands, and she was glaring intensely at the scene before her, yet still managing to roll her pale gray eyes at the boy. Both where wearing bright orange shirts with the same logo, cargo shorts, and beads tied around their neck.

The boy pulled a pen from his pocket and it turned into the sword Peter was fairly certain he'd just thrown at the harpy. They came to a halt on either side of Peter and Sam. Peter got the message and kept running, and they ran with him, going backwards and deflecting any harpy that tried to dive bomb them again.

"Ah! Feathers! Too many feathers! Why couldn't they be scales or something, they're less distracting!" The boy commented in mild annoyance as he spluttered, getting a stray red feather out of his mouth.

"Only _you_ seaweed brain…" She quipped, but still managed to do so with an air of fondness.

Seaweed brain? Son of Poseidon. The symbol at the train station. Daughter of Athena. These were the legends at camp? Peter felt kind of honored they'd waste their time helping him, the newbie as Sam had put it. Indeed, as they slashed and swiped at the harpies, they seemed to be having fun. This must not be what they considered 'hard', and they made Peter feel kind of pathetic as he struggled for his and Sam's life to keep moving forward.

Suddenly, the road curved off to the left, and on the right he saw a great hill and a towering pine tree on top. He was fairly certain there was what looked like a _dragon_ guarding it, and he kind of hoped it was on their side. It didn't look scary; in fact, it looked like it was _asleep, _even through all the commotion_._

He would have been relieved if a great shadow hadn't moved in the forest on the other side of the road from the hill at the same moment he spotted the tree.

They looked like dogs, but Peter was almost completely sure dogs couldn't be the size of small cars with glowing red eyes and fangs the size of chef knives. He was also completely sure he would have been eaten alive if the other two weren't there, because there was _no way_ in HADES he could fight three off by himself on top of the harpies.

"Hellhounds!" He choked, and the boy and girl spun on their heels.

"Crap." The girl hissed.

"Get them up the hill," The boy said, his joking demeanor slipping some as he rushed the dogs without any thought.

"Percy, I- oh, the hell with it!" She snapped, not trying to stop him. She wasn't looking and a harpy swept down, taking advantage of her distraction, and its wing collided sharply with the girl. She was thrown away from Peter and Sam, but on her feet the next instant, slashing away at the dive bombing harpies. "Get up the hill!" She cried to him, and Peter knew once he got up there he'd be safe.

But he didn't go. He was here to learn to fight monsters and what good would it do if the first _real_ chance he got to face those monsters, he turned and ran? He'd been running for a freaking _long_ time, and he was just about done with it.

He slid Sam down the ground—saying a silent apology to the injured satyr— and pulled the bow off his shoulders. He slipping one of the arrows still in his shredded pack to the bow too fast to think about it, pulled back with all the strength he had left, and let it fly. It sung through the air and hit its target square on. The girl glanced at him, shocked as the harpy she'd just been slashing at disappeared without her killing it.

Four more arrows went flying through the air, and Peter didn't even know how he knew what to do, how to hold the grip, how to angle the string, how to hole the arrow in place, but he did, and not one arrow missed. Not one arrow was wasted.

The girl nodded at him, impressed, but turned and took off to help—Percy was his name?—fight the hellhounds. They fought fiercely as a team, dodging the giant dog's lunges and snapping jaws. The girl spring boarded off one dog's side and landed on another's back, sinking her knife to the hilt just above its neck. Simultaneously, Percy lunged and slashed away his dog's head as it tried to swallow him whole, and his strike was so strong, the dog's head was forced up, leaving its chest exposed. In swift motions, he slashed its neck and sunk his blade into its heart. Both dogs exploded into that golden mist, and they turned as one to the third. Their service was not required though, as an arrow went straight into the monster's eye, plummeting deep into its head, and it disappeared as well.

Peter let his bow arm drop as they looked back at him. He almost fell over right there he was so tired, but he remembered Sam, and another rush of energy coursed through him. Slipping the bow around his shoulders again, he lifted his friend into his arms.

"That dragon won't eat me right?" He asked in a raspy voice as he made for the hill again, and the boy and girl ran back to help him.

"Uh, no, he's friendly." The girl reassured him.

"Here, let me help." Percy offered, taking Sam from Peter. Sam was a pretty small kid, so it wasn't much for Peter—who was pretty lean and only averagely muscled—to carry him, but Percy had five or six inches on him and was easily three times his muscle mass. He looked hard and weathered, like a true warrior, and it coupled oddly with his bright, twinkling eyes and his almost gleeful, child-like persona. Peter knew Percy could carry Sam like it was nothing-hell, he could carry all three of them without breaking a sweat- and he _was_ really tired, so he let his friend go. They made their way up the hill, the girl hovering over Peter, like she was ready to catch him if he suddenly collapsed. He was tired and beat and bleeding, but not so much he couldn't struggle up a hill. Especially now that the monsters were gone.

"I'm Percy Jackson." The boy said brightly, grinning cheerfully. It didn't seem quite the right attitude after a fight to the death, but it definitely cheered Peter in an odd way. He was worried about Sam, those claws looked like they did _a lot_ of damage, but Percy seemed upbeat and unconcerned with Sam's well-being. He saw Annabeth—who seemed like she'd know more about injuries—give the satyr a quick glance over, and didn't seem too worried either.

"Annabeth Chase." The girl said, still looking more worried for Peter than for Sam, and had him wondering what kind of state he was in. He knew he was covered in blood, but he couldn't tell which cuts were still bleeding.

"I'm Peter… Poseidon and Athena?" Peter asked, gesturing to the respective people. Annabeth looked surprised.

"You know all about the Greek gods already?" She seemed impressed, which Peter had a feeling was hard to do, and was kind of pleased with himself. "You knew what the hellhounds were, and you already seem pretty capable with a bow."

Peter shrugged. "I've known for a while… dreams and stuff… I'm just glad it didn't turn out to all be in my head." They seemed to accept that answer, probably assuming demigod dreams were strange enough to cover any inconsistency.

They got to the top of the hill, and Peter froze.

Camp Half Blood looked eerily like his old hometown. Not the climbing wall with fire spewing from it, or the arena where kids looked to be dueling, but the small cluster of cabins, the low roof of a pavilion, the open-air theater looking dining area, the large white house near the center… it resembled that small town in Germany in a strange way. The buildings weren't big, there were no real roads, there were fields of fruit—strawberries it smelled like—lots of open land, a clear lake, and forests. There were people wandering about with a purpose, but no rush. Not too many people, but enough to give it an inhabited, homey feel. Even the laugher and cries drifting up to them made it seem peaceful. It was safe. It was his old home, brought back to life.

There were tears in his eyes but he pulled them back before they could fall. If the other two noticed, they said nothing.

"Normally we'd take you to see Chiron first, but I think you could use a trip to the infirmary." Annabeth said, pulling him through the camp and to a wooded building with a lot of kids nursing battle wounds.

"Uh oh." A girl said when she spotted Sam. "Put him here." Percy placed the satyr on an empty cot, and a girl and two other boys immediately went to work on him.

"Cripes, who took a lawn mower to you?" Another girl asked, taking Peter and making him sit on a nearby cot. His back was to Sam, so he couldn't see what they were doing to him, but Annabeth and Percy came around to face him as the girl inspected his cuts.

"Harpies." Percy chimed in. "And hellhounds. Quite the welcoming committee." Peter said nothing. The girl wasn't looking at Peter himself, more only at his cuts.

"Here: eat this, drink this." She handed him a small square of something he couldn't place, and a canteen of some sort of liquid. Usually, he'd be wary of a stranger giving him food, but he popped it into his mouth anyway. If they truly wanted him dead, they'd've jut watched as he was eaten by deformed dogs and birds.

He froze again, and his eyes went wide. It tasted like bread his mom used to make… his mom in Germany. It was for Karneval, a celebration before lent and a lot like Mardi Gras in America: three days of parties. Peter's family wasn't Catholic, but everyone had fun during Karneval. His mother used to make _Bries, _which he supposed looked a lot like flat doughnuts with no holes in the middle, but the bread was denser and sweeter. A lot of people made them, but he loved his mother's best, because she mixed honey and rose water into the dough before she baked them.

All three of them smirked at his expression. "What is it?" He gasped, his mouth still full. He was almost afraid to keep eating it.

"Ambrosia and Nectar." Annabeth said. "The food of the gods. Demigods can eat it, but only in small amounts, because too much will burn us up."

"Imagine the poor demigod who figured that out the hard way…."Percy wondered randomly, and both girls looked at him for a moment before moving on. Apparently that happened a lot and they'd learned to ignore it.

"Anyway… in small amounts, it has healing powers." Annabeth continued and Peter reluctantly began to chew and swallow. Immediately, he felt some of his cuts closing and renewed energy surged through him. He took a sip or two of the nectar and it tasted like cold spring water from a mountain stream—so fresh and pure- and still more cuts healed. He started to feel feverish so he stopped, not liking what she meant when she said 'burn up'.

"What does it taste like?" Percy asked curiously. Peter stared at him. Had he never been hurt before to try it? He wondered randomly if he was invincible. That made Peter even more nervous and honored he'd spent his time helping him fight off his monsters.

"He means, what did it taste like to you." Annabeth clarified. "It tastes different for everyone, becoming a sort of comfort food for each individual." Oh, that made more sense, and it comforted him a bit. It would be the coincidence of the century if two places seventy years apart had the same food. It would be too weird for him to handle if they just _happened_ to have the same food as his dream mom's homemade, personal recipe.

"Bries." Peter said, still amazed at the food. "It was a sort of… bread type thing my mom used to make. Bread with honey and rose water." Annabeth smiled at the fond look on Peter's face.

"Cool!" Percy beamed. "Mine tastes like my mom's chocolate chip cookies… hmm…" He smiled at the memory and Annabeth rolled her eyes.

"Holy _crap!"_ The girl inspecting Peter gasped and everyone in the infirmary looked at her, alarmed, Peter included.

"What?!" He asked, slightly panicked. Percy and Annabeth were leaning forward slightly like they were preparing to defend themselves, others who'd heard her were trying to see what she was seeing. She was holding one of Peter's knees, treating where the gravel from his fall had scraped off his skin.

"You… your knees are broken…." She said in a daze. Then her eyes focused sharply on Peter's face. "But I _watched_ you walk in here!" She accused him, still shocked.

"Huh, no wonder they hurt." Peter said dully, looking at his own knees, thinking. That fall must've really done a number on his legs. Annabeth and Percy's jaws were on the floor.

"Lie down!" The girl insisted, pushing him down on the cot and beginning to wrap his legs up in splints.

"What happened?" Annabeth asked and Peter told them about Lamia at school, and then traveling to New York, and then the battle up until they entered. He explained about the fall.

"Who's-?"

"Demon snake-lady who likes to eat children." Peter answered, having a feeling Percy would ask that. Annabeth seemed to be the brains of that pair.

"How old are you?" Annabeth measured him up, almost challengingly. She had just been about to answer her boyfriend's question too and didn't like being one-upped. Peter made note of that. Annabeth didn't seem like the person you'd want as your competition—or your enemy. Neither of them did, but Annabeth especially, because it seemed like it'd be really hard to get on Percy's bad side. He assumed whoever Annabeth hated, Percy would dislike as well, simply on principle.

"Twelve." He answered, but he had to think about that for a moment. He _wasn't_ twenty, though he felt like it.

"You seem…_ older_ or something." Annabeth challenged.

"It's… complicated. Too complicated, if you ask me." He sighed and let his eyes close. He really was tired, but he didn't think he'd be able to sleep. It seemed like years ago he'd woken up as Cameron at three am to a dream about Peter… and now he _was_ Peter.

"But you used our storage room?" Percy said in an excited whisper.

"Shut up, let him sleep!" Annabeth scolded him.

"No, I'm awake," Peter reassured them, opening his eyes again. "…just thinking. And yeah, that room is cool. It really helped seeing as I had no weapon and Sam threw his shoes at Lamia." Percy lit up.

"Ha! _Told_ you putting shoes in there was important!" He cried triumphantly, and Annabeth wacked him upside the head.

"Oh, no need to brag!" She snapped. Then to Peter, "That still doesn't explain how you could break both your knees, then get up and keep running." She stared into his eyes like she was trying to find something. It made Peter uncomfortable. He vaguely noticed her eyes looked really familiar, but he couldn't place where he'd seen them before.

"I, uh… I don't know." He shrugged. "They kept coming after me, and one still had Sam, and I just…. Well, was stopping even an option?"

No, it wasn't. He stopped, they died, and that was it. It didn't matter if he broke his knees, because if he sat and cried about it, he'd be a corpse with broken knees. Percy looked impressed while Annabeth looked wary.

"But even after all that was done… you walked into camp just fine."

"Adrenaline. A lot of it. Has to be." The girl wrapping his knees up declared.

"Or the mark of a hero." A calm voice said and everyone turned to see an older man in a wheelchair gliding through the infirmary to where Peter and company were. "One cannot simply attribute every great accomplishment to adrenaline, some credit is due to the hero who mustered on. I heard what happened; this camp tends to gossip like old women." He smiled warmly and Peter returned it nervously.

"Chiron!" Percy greeted him. "This is Peter, new arrival, and Peter, this is Chiron, the head camp counselor of sorts."

"Of sorts, yes. Pleasure to meet our newest hero." Chiron reached out and grasped Peter's hand. Peter's eyes went wide. Chiron as in, the centaur Chiron? The trainer of the greatest mythical heroes _ever_ Chiron?

"Uh… you too sir." Peter mumbled. "Uh… Chiron as in the centaur, 'trainer of heroes' Chiron?"

Chiron's eyes twinkled at being recognized. "Yes my boy, that Chiron. Looking good for being a couple thousand years old, don't I?" Peter could only nod, still gaping, and Percy burst into laughter. "What's this?" Chiron asked, pointing at the bandages wrapped around his legs. "I saw you walk in myself, don't tell me you've already met our, uh, unofficial welcoming committee?"

Peter blinked. "The harpies and hellhounds?" remembering what Percy said earlier.

Percy himself, snorted. "Uh, no, that would be the Ares cabin. They're a bit aggressive and like to… make themselves known to all new campers." Peter didn't like the sound of the children of the war god, and made a mental note to avoid them until he wasn't new anymore.

"Sounds like charming people, I'm sure." He sighed, and Percy snorted again. Annabeth turned to Chiron and explained the battle.

"Hmm… quite impressive." He complimented Peter, who blushed. "Tougher than you look, if you don't take offense." Peter didn't. He didn't have Percy's muscles or Annabeth's ferocity and wits. It was surprising he was even alive, even to himself.

"Wuh happened…" Sam's familiar voice groaned from behind Chiron on the cot next to Peter's.

"Ah, young Samuel. Nice to see you again." Chiron said, turning to the satyr.

"He shouldn't be awake!" The boy over him exclaimed, stressed and talking quickly. "_You_ shouldn't be awake!" He said into Sam's face. "Your chest is ripped open, you should be out cold for hours from blood loss, you can't be awake!"

"I'm dead…" Sam breathed. "I'm dead, I'm totally dead…"

"No, you're in the infirmary, so shut up and let us stitch up these cuts." A girl told him gently.

"But…" Sam's eyes seemed to come into focus as he took in the room and the kids treating his wounds. "But… that harpy nearly ripped my heart out! Her claws…." He was staring amazed at his own chest.

"They're just superficial cuts." Percy went over to him, reassuring him. "If they'd been worse I'd've gotten here much faster. You were barely bleeding when I picked you up."

"What?" Peter sat up jerkily now, alarmed, annoying the girl trying to treat his legs. He'd _seen_ those claws cut right through him, and he was bleeding a lot worse… there's _no way_ a few stitches is all he'd need. "Those claws went straight through him! I saw them out his back! He can't be fine!" Everyone stared at him for a moment, even Sam whose mouth was gaping, before some of the Apollo kids collected their wits and rolled Sam onto his side.

Sure enough, on his back opposite the scraps on his front, were five slits in his shirt where the claws had torn the fabric by going through him; patches of blood soaked around the holes where the gashes had been. But where the wounds should have been on his skin, there were five small white lines, like scars that had long ago healed.

"This is too strange, first knee-boy here and now an un-killable satyr? This is strange, so strange…" The girl who'd been treating Peter started to mutter to herself, and moved to get more materials.

"It seems you both have been blessed." Chiron said, sounding surprised himself. "If you were full out attacked by half a dozen furies, I can assume some of these cuts were much worse than they appear now, even after some Ambrosia." He pointed to Peter's shredded shirt that was hanging onto one shoulder by a couple threads. Peter remembered the claws being dragged across his back, and reached back to feel the skin there.

There were a few ridges, like scar lines, but no wounds anymore, no pain or bleeding or scabs. He had a feeling that no amount of magic food squares could've healed that without setting him on fire. Chiron seemed to see that on his face.

"Ok, you're right, Apollo is your dad." Sam grunted as he was man-handled like a small doll as the Apollo kids moved him this way and that, fixing what they could reach. Chiron sat up a little straighter.

"What's this about Apollo?"

"Cam-uh, Peter had a feeling Apollo was his dad. I was skeptical, and then he shot Lamia with a pole rigged in a harp like a bow, and now we're magically healed from being half-dead. All he needs to do now is start singing kumbaya and I'd bet my life he's right." Sam interjected.

"I don't sing." Peter frowned at him.

"What?" One of the kids mending Sam said, freezing. "I'm all for you being a son of Apollo, but if you are, we're gonna have to fix that!" With a jolt, Peter realized that if he _was_ a son of Apollo, all these kids mending the injured would be his brothers and sisters. His heart fluttered. He'd never had any siblings before, in either life.

"How do you know this? Was your mother aware he was a god?" Annabeth asked. Suddenly, Peter felt the awkward conversation of trying to convince them he was a reincarnated soul approaching, and he didn't particularly want to do it in front of the camp's legends and all his possible siblings. Sam seemed to notice the look on his face.

"Hey, Chiron, do you think we could have some time to catch up? I mean, just regain our senses a bit before we get the Spanish inquisition?" Peter shot him a grateful look, and Chiron looked politely abashed.

"Oh yes, of course! Where are my manners? I'm sure you're both exhausted! I'll stop by later to explain things and then once you're feeling better, I'll have someone show you around camp." His smile was friendly, but Peter knew he didn't miss Sam's subject change, or Peter's panicked look. He bid them farewell and rolled out of the infirmary, talking with Annabeth about something.

The Apollo kids finished fixing the two boys up and warned them not to move, and suddenly it was just them and Percy. Peter collapsed back against his pillow, thankful for the peace.

"You don't have to hide, you know. I'm sure Chiron's heard it before." Percy said, taking a seat on the cot on Peter's other side.

"What?" He asked, confused about what he meant.

"When he asked about your mom, you got freaked and Sam covered for you." Apparently Peter's initial judgment of Percy had been wrong: he really was quite observant. "And I know telling authority figures things can be rough—especially when you _know_ they're not telling _you_ everything—but Chiron's on our side. No matter what problem you have, he'll take your side before anything else."

"Even if_ I _don't know if I'm right?" He mumbled.

"Especially then. Go with your instincts, they rarely let you down." Percy winked mischievously. He stood and went to the foot of his bed. "I think you know this place is already like home." Peter blinked—how did he know that? "And it is in a way, because you're related in some way to most everyone here. No one's going to judge you or throw you out because you showed up with issues—hell, almost _everyone_ shows up with some kind of a problem. It's like a requirement or something. Sure, some will give you a hard time and challenge you, just like family does, but know there are at least a couple people who're on your side. If you can't tell Chiron, find someone you _can._" He grinned and patted Peter's foot before heading for the door. "Oh! And Sam?"

"What?" Sam looked up at him.

"You owe me twenty bucks!" He laughed and darted out the door before Sam could find something to throw at him.

"REALLY? You're gonna bring that up NOW?!" He hollered after him, but he was gone.

"Why do you owe him money?" Peter asked, and Sam turned red.

"I, uh… I was kind of picking on this mutual friend of ours, Grover, who's another satyr and the one who brought Percy to camp…. I sort of implied that I could do better than he did his first time out…"

"You and you're big mouth." Peter joked. He knew Sam would say anything when his pride was at stake. Plus he was competitive, and didn't know when to say _no_ to a challenge.

"Shut up." He grimaced. "I don't know how it happened, but I somehow ended up in this _bet…._ Grover would probably have just let it go, he's real easy going and stuff, but Percy's really loyal to his friends and wanted me to put my money where my mouth was… stupid harpies, I could've won!"

"Wait, I was your first camper?" Peter smirked and Sam flushed again.

"Well, yeah! But I'm only sixteen, probably the youngest satyr to be searching out new demigods in centuries."

"Impressive." Peter, not missing a beat in the discovery that his friend was four years older than he thought he'd been, and thinking that he didn't look more than ten. He was absolutely minuscule. "Looks like we're both older than we look."

"That's right," Sam realized. "You feel twenty… plus your twelve years as Cameron, you're what? Thirty something?"

"Thirty two." Peter leaned back, considering that. "I feel older though. Everything I went through before, it just seems like I should be ninety."

"No kidding." Sam muttered sympathetically. "All demigods feel like adults before their even out of their teens. You felt like that and you didn't even know monsters existed until the last minute."

"Oh, I knew monsters existed, just not the kind that crawl out of Tartarus." Peter sighed, and Sam fell quiet.

"Sorry dude." Again with the apology for more than just sympathy.

"So…" Peter wanted to fill the stressed pause. "What did Grover do that you thought you could beat? And how did you fail? I thought we got pretty close." Sam snorted.

"We _always_ get _close._ Always to within a couple miles of camp, and that's when things go wrong. I _told_ you I had reason to be nervous! You jinxed us by saying 'chances are we won't get attacked last minute!'" He mimicked poorly, and Peter smiled that that's what he just _had_ to point out. Sam loved 'I told you so's. "But… about twelve years ago, Grover found a group of demigods and got them to within spitting distance of the camp. Then the monsters attacked and he went down. Some demigods pulled him across the boundary, while one stayed and fought so they could escape. She died, and her spirit was turned into that tree we passed. It helped protect the camp boarders for six years." Sam sighed. "The _only _way I could've lost is if someone died again, and if not for Apollo, we'd both…Argh!" He huffed.

"It's a long story, I'll fill you in later, but basically Grover failed at that mission—his first mission- because not everyone got across safe. Two were fine, including Annabeth and another boy named Luke." He seemed to shift uncomfortably when he mentioned Luke. "It was a big deal because the girl that went down—Thalia Grace- was the daughter of Zeus."

"The king of the Gods." Peter clarified. He could totally see it being an issue when the boss's kid gets murdered.

Sam nodded. "Yep. Big issue. Technically, things were bad before, and Grover _did_ have all the odds stacked against him, so I really shouldn't have said anything, but…"

"Why was it so difficult?"

Sam pursed his lips. "The… uh… well, this is awkward."

Peter sat up and looked him in the eye. "_Why, _may I ask?" Sam gulped.

"Well… you know World War 2 was caused by a fight between the children of Hades and Zeus, right?"

Peter nodded. "And Hitler was a son of Hades."

"Oh… ok, it's less awkward now. It's just…."

"You thought I'd take it personally or something? That I might lash out on the kids of Hades and Zeus and blame them for what happened to me?"

Sam shrugged. "I didn't know what to think. But anyway, you wouldn't run into them often anyway."

"Why?"

"Because after the war, they realized how powerful and destructive the children of the big three are. They had extra powers and were just all around stronger than your average demigod." Peter suddenly didn't feel so helpless next to Percy. At least there was a reason. "Plus, there was a prophecy that said the next child of the big three to turn sixteen might destroy the gods and the world… or save it but they weren't concentrating on that point. The three made a pact not to have any more children and avoid the prophecy all together."

"But Thalia was an almost-camper twelve years ago… And then Percy…"

"Some didn't keep their oath." Sam shrugged. "Only Hades did, and still… he basically put his kids on ice so he could pull them out at the right moment and use them to fulfill the prophecy in his favor." Peter sat bolt upright.

Nico and Bianca… the prophecy… is this what Hades was playing at? How horrible.

But then, he realized, if they _had_ lived in 1942 with him, they would have died in the hotel collapse just like he had. Them and their mother.

He felt his heart constrict as he shoved that thought away. He never concentrated on the fact too long when hoping his dreams were real.

"T_echnically_, Hades _didn't_ break the oath, but he took major offense his brothers did. He sent twenty times the amount of monsters demigods usually have to fight, and even though Thalia had help and some experience, it was a lot to ask of anyone… the fact Grover couldn't save her –on his first mission at that—wasn't a huge surprise in hindsight."

Sam then smirked. "What's kinda funny though, is that he failed at his _second_ mission too. Technically, he failed to save Percy, because _Percy_ was the one to carry him across the boundary." He told him all about Percy's first fights with the fury and the Minotaur. Peter didn't feel like his victory against the harpies was quite so impressive after all, and he said so.

"Don't be bummed, Percy's the stuff of legends! His myth came out a few months ago, which is how I know so much detail. You should read it, it's pretty epic." Peter rolled his eyes. Books: his _favorite._

But wow, Percy had his own myth. That really was impressive.

"So…" He didn't know how to phrase this without making Sam suspicious. "Hades _had_ kids, but he… put them on ice? Why would he do that?"

"The prophecy stated the rise or fall of the gods rested on the next child of the big three to turn sixteen, and right before they made the pact to have no more children, Zeus tried to kill the kids Hades already had. They were what? Ten and thirteen at the time? He wanted to stop them from getting to sixteen, but Hades _wanted_ the prophecy to be about his kids because he wanted his kids to destroy the gods. He was all pissed about not getting recognition on Olympus and whatnot, so that's his issue. Anyway, Zeus managed to blow up the hotel they and their mother were in, and they watched their mother die. Pretty traumatic stuff. Hades wiped their memories so they'd forget that, and put them in the Lotus Casino, which slows-"

"Like the Lotus eaters? From the myth of Orpheus?" Peter interrupted. Sam nodded.

Huh, so they didn't age… and they were from around the war… and the hotel…

"But, about five years ago, when we were getting near crunch time of this prophecy coming true with Percy and Thalia in play, Hades took them _out_ of the Casino, so they had a chance of fulfilling it."

"But they didn't?" Peter guessed. Sam shook his head.

"No, the older girl joined the Hunter's of Artemis along with Thalia and became immortal (no ageing), but was killed on a quest a few weeks later. The boy was too young and sort of went rouge after she died, and the prophecy became about Percy. I even read the myth and I'm confused if Percy _actually_ fulfilled it, but I guess he did in a way-"

"What were their names? The children of Hades?" Peter interrupted again, his heart going faster now. This sounded _way_ too familiar.

"Uh, Bianca and Nico di Angelo." Sam supplied and Peter's jaw dropped.

"What?" Sam looked suspiciously at him.

"What happened? Tell me everything." Sam looked confused at Peter's intensity, but relented.

He told him everything he's learned from the five books of the Percy Jackson myths, all about how Grover found Percy and brought him to camp, about his trip to the Underworld, Zeus' lightning bolt, and then the poisoning of Thalia's tree and his trip to the sea of monsters. Then Thalia came back as a person and joined the hunter's of Artemis and never aged and could never fulfill the prophecy.

Then he talked about two children of Hades, kept in the Lotus casino with no memories since the 1940's that Percy rescued and how the girl joined the hunters and was killed on a quest.

"Woah, are you ok?" Sam sat up, wincing at his wounds some. He'd noticed Peter was silently crying.

"Fine." Peter wiped the tears away quickly and looked determinedly at the wall. "I'll… explain later. Just finish. Please…" Sam sat back and hesitated, but continued on in his story.

He explained everything about the Titans—most of which Peter knew from research—and Luke and the rise of Kronos. He explained the cruise ship, the Labyrinth, the battles and the people lost, even Daedalus and Ms. O'Leary. He talked about the prophecy and the war in New York, and how Percy had the mark of Achilles and saved Olympus, and how Luke himself killed Kronos, and why he wasn't sure if the prophecy was _really _about Percy or Luke or whatever. Then he explained how Percy had turned down immortality, Peter couldn't helped but be shocked enough to break him out of his daze of worry.

"That's…"

"Foolish?" Sam offered.

"Honorable." Peter decided. "I can see it, I can see him choosing that. He doesn't seem like the kind of guy who'd want to sit on the sidelines for all eternity." Sam considered that and nodded in agreement.

Once Peter was caught up on absolutely every little detail Sam knew from reading the books, the satyr leaned back, exhausted.

"You could've picked a shorter story to ask about." He complained. By now, everything was dark and it was well into the night. The Apollo kids had left them there to rest until morning, and everything was quiet. Sam said dinner and campfire were long over, but neither of them felt up to either activity anyway.

They listened to the sounds of the night for a while, and Peter wondered about the monster sounds coming from the direction he'd seen the forests.

"So. You gonna tell me why the di Angelo kids had you crying?" Sam had explained everything he knew about them: from their arrival, to Bianca's death, to Nico blasting apart the pavilion, to him in the Labyrinth, and then convincing Percy to jump in the river Styx and fighting in the Battle of Manhattan with his father. He was what? Fifteen now? Five years he'd lived in this day and age, with no memories of his and Peter's time.

He felt a surge of grief when he thought of Bianca. Nico was nice and all, but he _was_ just a child when they met, and Bianca was the one who sat him down and explained everything that was happening. Peter had dreamt all his new life of those two, he'd obsessed over those memories, trying to figure out if they were true, and now he learned they were in fact very real people. Bianca was a very real and living person, but she had died. Peter felt like a part of him died too.

And Nico was one screwed up kid from what he'd heard. He'd certainly gone through the ringer with his sister's death, and then running off and finding his powers again… powers Bianca had said scared her.

"_He's so strong… and he doesn't even know it. The first time he moved earth with his thoughts, he nearly crushed us. He conjures up skeletons in his sleep; he summons ghosts when he has nightmares."She'd fretted to Peter one day. Nico and his mother were off somewhere, preparing to leave the next morning- the morning the hotel would be hit by Zeus. "He once tripped and fell into a shadow, and we couldn't find him for days until one of the furies found him in New Zealand…! And then… and then he just starts crying sometimes, and when we ask why, he just says he'd sad so many people who didn't do anything wrong had to die…and I think… I think he can hear the people dying in the war…." She had to collect herself. "He has no control… and when he _tries_ to do something, it's like there's a block. He's afraid of himself, but he won't admit it for anything. Stubborn little thing he is."_

He's had five years—five years and a war—to help him gain control. He didn't have a father forcing him into a prophecy that turned out not to be about him, and he didn't have any family or close friends by him all that time to worry about if he lost control. Then again, he had no memories of all the powers he'd learned to use before being put in that casino…

He was sad for Bianca, and scared of Nico. Grieved for his lost sister, worried about his lost, little brother. Of all the revelations and new things today had brought, _this_ was what scared him the most. He honestly didn't know how to feel.

"Earth to Ca-um, Peter? Anyone home? You asleep?" Sam called softly.

"No, I'm just… thinking it all over." How did he even start? "… Nico and Bianca saw their mother die?" He felt a stab of pain over Ms. di Angelo as well. She was a lovely woman, and so kind and welcoming to him: by all means a mother to him as well.

"…yes." Sam said in a small voice. He was afraid at the direction Peter was taking this conversation.

"And Hades wiped their memories and put them into a casino where they didn't age?"

Something seemed to click for Sam. "Where they stayed for seventy years… after world war 2…."

"And their mother died because Zeus destroyed the hotel they were in?" Peter was fighting tears now.

"Oh my gods… they were the demigods you met?" Sam gasped, horror dawning on his face.

"Bianca and Ms. di Angelo are dead, and Nico's fifteen or something…." Peter couldn't stop the sob that escaped his lips. "And now I _know_ my dreams are real. They aren't dreams, they're memories." Tears streamed down his face, but there was no one but Sam to see, so he didn't try to stop them.

"Oh…_crap._ Dude… I'm so sorry… then again, at least we have some proof…"

"It isn't proof." Peter mumbled softly. "I could still be channeling someone else's memories… but now I know I'm channeling their emotions too, because just the thought that Bianca…" He tried to control the tears as he thought of the girl he'd thought of as a sister being killed. "I don't care if I'm not really Peter, I cared for Bianca and Nico just like they were my brother and sister. I _still_ care, even if they don't remember me…" Sam fell silent.

"This is crazy! I wake up in Pennsylvania with Cameron as my best friend, and twenty hours and two near-death experiences later, I'm going to sleep back at Camp Half Blood with Peter!" Sam burst out. "Our lives are nuts!" He cried and Peter couldn't help but burst into laughter. "What!?" Sam cried in indignation, but Peter couldn't stop laughing.

"Screw it, you need sleep. You're hysterical!" Sam snapped and rolled over on his side, facing away from his friend.

"Love you Sam," Peter mocked and Sam raised his hand half-heartedly over his shoulder in recognition.

"Yeah, yeah, get some rest and I'll get back to you tomorrow." Peter laughed some more before gazing blankly at the canvas roof of the infirmary, tears still sitting on his cheeks. It didn't take long and he was sound asleep.


	4. May 26th, 2015

He must have really been wiped out from the previous day, because Peter woke the next morning from a dreamless sleep.

_Thank the gods._ Was his first thought when he woke to the sounds of people moving around outside, and he felt perfectly rested. Then everything that had happened the day before came rushing back and he sat bolt upright, inhaling the faintly strawberry-ish scent of Camp Half Blood.

Holy crap, that actually happened.

He took in the empty infirmary, the golden light streaming in from the sun breaking over the camp outside, Sam still sleeping soundly in the cot next to him, the sound of birds and monsters and campers waking up, and finally, the braces still confining his legs. He tried to wiggle his legs around, and they felt perfectly fine. He tried to bend his supposedly broken knees, but the stint held them strait. If anything, his muscles felt sore from being held in one position all night.

Quickly, before any Apollo kids came back to check on their patients and saw what he was doing, he un-did the bindings and braces to released his legs. He bent them up to his chest and rotated them this way and that, and besides being in desperate need of a stretch, they felt fine. In fact, he felt like he could run a mile.

That must be what a good night's rest can do for you.

He inspected his other wounds, and found them gone. Not even a scar in sight.

Ok, that was weird.

Sam had sprawled out in his sleep, and Peter got up – yep, still nothing wrong with his legs—and checked his friend's wounds as well. No scars there either. Not even a mark, just a shredded shirt.

"Apollo, even if you're not my father, you still rock." He thanked the god in a whisper. He was very thankful especially that the god not only saved his maybe-son, but his best friend satyr as well.

"WHAT ARE YOU DOING UP?!" A girl's voice shattered the still morning, and Sam woke with a start.

"Wuh-?" He choked out, wiping the drool from the side of his mouth.

"I, uh, let me explain-!" Peter stuttered.

"UH-UH, GET BACK IN BED RIGHT NOW OR SO HELP ME GODS-!" Peter leapt backwards and into his cot again as the girl who'd treated him yesterday stalked forward, her glare promising death if he didn't obey. Peter had a full head on her, but he was more scarred of her than the harpies.

"Please, I'm fine, I don't need-"

"Shut up." She snapped and pushing him back down into a lying position. She glared daggers when she saw he'd removed his braces.

"Gale, really, we both feel fine!" Sam tried to reassure the girl but it didn't work. She swiftly searched both boys for any signs of injuries, but came up empty. She looked furious.

She had long, dark brown hair that fell down her back tied up in a French braid, and sky-blue eyes that stared sharply at the boys. She had pale skin, but a splattering of dark freckles over her nose and cheeks. She wore the trademark orange camp shirt Peter had seen other campers wearing and a necklace with eight beads around it. Unlike the other campers though, she wore a pleated, pale blue skirt that went to her knees, white toms for shoes, and a starched white apron with the symbol of Apollo on the front. She had a silver headband over her braid to keep back any flyaways, simple pearl stud-earrings, and a silver watch. She couldn't have been more than thirteen or fourteen, but she looked like a nurse strait out of the forties or fifties time era.

"People do not simply get _mauled_ by harpies and hellhounds, and _get up_ like nothing happened twelve hours later!" She snapped.

"But we're fine!" Peter insisted.

"Down girl!" A boy strolled in the front door smiling, and seemed to find much amusement at the scene before him. "Gale, you need to loosen up! Obviously they got a blessing from Dad, these things _do_ happen. What if you're freaking out our future brother? I doubt you'd feel _guilty _per say_, _but at least have a little decorum for our guests!" He strolled over to his sister as he talked, and lazily wrapped one arm around her shoulders, squeezing a little to get her to lighten up.

"I'm Remus Talc, but just call me Remy." He flashed a blinding, super-white grin, and Peter had the urge to blink. "Galena here thinks it's her job to single-handedly fix the world." He told them matter-of-factly, patting her on the back and she shrugged out of his arm.

"Not in the mood Remus." She scowled, purposely saying his full name in response to him using hers. "Broken bones do not just _go _away over night! I just don't understand-"

"Let them leave Gale." Remy whined. "You can't keep everyone here in your little bubble!" She looked ready to explode.

"Fine! Just go! Get out of my infirmary!" She threw he hands up and stalked to the back end of the room, collecting materials lying around and arranging them neatly on shelves, looking angrier and angrier as she went.

"Sorry 'bout that! She's in a bad mood." Remy apologized for her to them.

"She's _always_ in a bad mood." Sam grumbled as he stood and stretched, getting ready to leave.

"She's doesn't like it when people get hurt." Remy shrugged, his grin fading a little. "She tries to keep people here so she can look after them, and she doesn't like it when they leave."

"Control issues much?" Sam muttered, and Peter swore he saw Remy's smile falter into worry for a split second before his blinding grin was back.

"Whatever, she's family! What can ya do?" He shrugged happily.

"Put some real clothes on before you leave." Gale stalked by the ends of their beds and chucked new clothes at the two boys who were still wearing harpy-shredded old shirts. She didn't make eye contact, and went right back to her organizing.

"Thanks…" Peter tried to convey his gratitude for more than just the shirt, but she just walked away and didn't acknowledge them.

"It's ok," Remy told him quietly, noticing her ignoring him. "Come on, let's show you the camp!" he cheered and after they'd changed into brand new camp shirts and new shorts, lead them out the front entrance.

Remy had windblown, dirty-blonde hair and sky-blue eyes set into perfectly tanned skin, the orange camp shirt, plain gray skinny jeans, and a beaded necklace with six beads on it. He was about a head and a half taller than Peter and just towered over Sam, but he had an easy-going, casual surfer-dude mentality about him. He looked muscled and athletic, but like a runner or soccer player would be, not built up anywhere or threatening looking. He was lean and sinewy, fast and quick but not obviously super strong like Percy. That dazzling grin of his seemed permanently glued to his lips, accentuating his gleaming white teeth and full lips, and Peter found himself relying more on what his instincts picked up of him rather than his appearance. His expressions and body language were constantly saying 'calm and no worries', but Peter could sense when something upset him—like when he pointed out the Ares cabin—though it never played out on his face.

Everything Peter saw made him love the camp more and more, from the cabins to the stables to the climbing wall to the archery target practice. Everything was wonderful, and he couldn't be happier, until he saw cabin number thirteen.

It was mighty and simple in one, with a few steps leading up to the black-wood porch and black marble pillars lining it like an evil Parthenon, but it didn't look any bigger—in fact it was slightly smaller—than all the other cabins. Its walls were solid obsidian black and the door was flagged by torches that burned a sinister green and sliver flame.

Nico designed that himself, and if the slightly evil feeling the building had wasn't an indication as to the personality of the new Nico, he didn't know what was. Sam saw him looking at it and caught his eye.

"Number thirteen, Hades' cabin. Though the only resident is rarely at camp. I think he's off training in the Underworld or at Camp Jupiter or something currently." He spoke like he was explaining any other thing at Camp so that Remy wouldn't notice, but Peter felt better. At least he could put off his inevitable meeting with Nico for a little while longer.

Sam had explained all about the Roman side of the demigod world, and Percy's switch with them to reunite. Peter, again, felt Percy was _way_ too nice. He should be some stuck up jerk, and rightfully so, with all the things he'd done. He was just too… _normal_ and nice to be some larger than life hero. He wondered what Jason was like, but Sam said he was a lot like Percy too.

"Aaaand the Lake." Remy said, gesturing to the crystal clear lake. "Freshwater, but if you swim out to the other side, there's a river that goes out to the ocean. We watch fourth of July fireworks on the beach out there every year, and you _don't_ want to miss that!" He explained. "And if you ever need Percy or Annabeth and can't find them, stand on that dock over there and scream. It might help to throw a large rock in too."

Peter cocked an eyebrow. "Excuse me?" He said, and they both snickered at his confusion. Just then Sam and Remy were blasted with two jets of water and sent rolling down the beach.

"I heard that!" Percy's voice called from a ways behind them. He ran and caught up to where Peter was standing, surprised but laughing at the now soaked boys. "Ignore that," He said to Peter, "And what's with you all healed and up and about? Looks like Apollo's got a new favorite!" He clapped him on the back as Remy and Sam sloshed their way back to them.

"Thanks Percy…" Sam grumbled.

"Don't let Taby hear you say that." Remy muttered to Percy, who just shrugged, grinning at his handiwork. He closed the gap between them and gripped them both on their shoulders, and they were suddenly dry.

"Tabitha Yearling, she's a daughter of Apollo, and a relatively new camper—she's only been here about a year—but she's the self-proclaimed best archer at camp." Sam explained to Peter.

"Aw, come on, give her a break! She dreams of being a Hunter of Artemis," Remy defended his sister. "And she's just a bit grumpy she, uh, well let's just say she didn't fit the qualifications."

"Meaning she stopped being a maiden quite some time ago." Sam finished bluntly for him, and Percy wacked him on the back of the head.

"Way to put it nicely." He rolled his eyes. "And she's not as bad as he put it, she just loves archery! Leo's the self-proclaimed best weapon's maker, the Stolls are the self-proclaimed best pranksters, Clarisse's the self-proclaimed best fighter-"

"Yeah, until she fights _you."_ Remy cut in. Percy rolled his eyes again.

"She doesn't count me because she says being the son of one of the big three is cheating. Plus, she killed the Drakon without breaking a sweat, so I'll let her have that one."

"But-!" Sam stopped himself, knowing he wouldn't win that fight. "You're too easygoing for you own good. I'm not saying that all those people aren't the best at what they do, and I'm not saying Taby isn't _really good_ at archery; I'm just saying she could be nicer about it."

Percy smiled. "I used to hate Clarisse for that, and a lot of people hated Drew and Miles and even the Cloven Council for exactly that reason." Sam flinched at that. "And I suppose we could all find reasons to hate every one of the gods for that reason. Pride is something a lot of people have, and if you hate them because of it, you're gonna lead a very stressful life!" He laughed/scolded them.

"Again, too easygoing for you own good." Sam repeated and Percy snorted at his crumpled face. Peter couldn't help but remember Sam had mentioned something about Annabeth's Fatal Flaw being hubris, her pride, and he wondered what dating Percy Jackson and his attitude towards pride was doing for her.

"Try to get to know people before you judge, that's all I'm saying." He reiterated.

"Oh, ah… she's my sister and I think I'm gonna side with Sam on this one." Remy said abashedly, and they all burst into snickers at Percy's exasperated face.

"Fine, whatever! Just let Peter make his own opinions." He winked at him mischievously again. "I think Peter here might actually give Taby a run for her money." Remy looked shocked, and suddenly very excited, while Sam pushed out his chest in pride for his friend. Peter just blushed.

"I, uh, well it wasn't-"

"Nope, you're not gonna be humble on this one! You were _really good_ yesterday. A total natural with the bow. I'm not surprised in the least that Apollo likes you. I'm sure Artemis would too if, uh, you know, she didn't hate all boys simply for being alive." He shrugged.

"You should see me with a sword though." Peter grimaced and Sam exploded in fits of laughter.

"Oh! He's horrible!" He cried and Percy smirked.

"As bad as me with a bow?" Sam came up short, remembering something, and then exploded again.

"Ok, not _that_ bad!" He admitted, and Peter suddenly felt loads better knowing Percy and him were stronger in their own ways. At least they wouldn't be directly compared if Peter's top strength was Percy's top weakness, and vice versa.

"And I'm sure I can get you some basic skills with a sword before the summer's over." Percy reassured him. He continued when he saw Peter's questioning look. "Over the past couple years, with the new 'claiming' agreement with the gods, and a lot of Roman kids staying here over the summer, attendance at camp has quadrupled, and they ran short on 'staff' or really, just people who volunteer to help train. Technically, at 19, I should have 'graduated' so to speak, and I'm old enough to leave camp, but I volunteered to teach sword skills and battle techniques during the summers with all the extra kids."

"Yeah, and it had _nothing_ to do with Annabeth volunteering to come back and teach Greek history and architecture and all that book-y stuff to the Romans." Remy cut in and Percy glared at him.

"Ha! Whatever…" He grumbled, and no one missed the fact that he didn't actually deny it. "Anyways!" He said quickly changing the subject. "Remy, I think you especially will be happy to hear that I convinced a certain someone to come back to camp for abilities training…" He hinted gleefully and Remy looked confused before it hit him and he practically jumped in the air in celebration.

"No way! He said yes? That's _awesome_!" He cheered.

"Who's coming back?" Sam asked the same time Peter asked, "What's abilities training?" Percy grinned but answered Peter first.

"Abilities training is a new thing the seven of the last prophecy came up with. Basically, more and more demigods are being born with extra powers that they have to figure out for themselves. Everyone's different, but we thought it'd be a good idea to set up some place for them to get a feel for their powers and what they can do and learn with each other. Sort of help each other out in a judgment-free kind of place."

"Powers are tricky, and it's not the same for everyone, but everything follows the same idea." Remy added. "I have this thing, where I, uh… _compel_ people to tell the absolute truth…but I don't really know how to turn it on and off, so sometimes I just…"

"That must be difficult." Peter sympathized.

He shrugged. "It's not a burden most of the time, but when it just 'goes on' I hear a lot of things that I probably would have been happy never knowing… and then people are spilling their guts and revealing secrets they'd never have told anyone and everyone's angry…" His grin looked incredibly forced and stressed.

"Hey, it's not _that _bad." Percy reassured him kindly, but Remy just laughed harshly once.

"Ha! Says the guy who says what he thinks as he thinks it. There isn't anything you think that you wouldn't tell someone; it doesn't bother _you. _But others…" Percy sighed, not disagreeing. He turned back to Peter.

"Like Remy, the seven all had powers that none of them knew how to use properly when they started out. We just thought we should really hammer those issues out _before_ the world depends on it and stuff." Percy shrugged like that happened a lot. "I learned mine over, what? Seven, eight years or something like that, and I'm still figuring out new stuff. Even now, I don't focus on it, more only sword skills. Powers training is just a place to focus _just_ on that."

"Most activities here could be individually run." Remy explained. "I mean, you could look up Greek history and swat at practice dummies with a sword all by yourself if you were so motivated, but it's a thousand times easier with a trainer." Remy gestured to Percy who shrugged his thanks at the recognition. "And those with powers… well we don't even know where to start or anything, it's just so foreign. We've been looking for a trainer who's really solid with their powers to lead us."

Percy clapped his hands in delight. "Yep! And I finally convinced death boy to come and help run it for a couple weeks!"

Sam's jaw dropped. "Nico's the new abilities trainer?"

Peter felt his own jaw drop and the horror spread across his face before he could stop it. For some reason, all he could picture was a hyper-active ten-year-old Nico standing at the front of a classroom of teenage demigods in full battle armor talking about the anatomy of a Ghost.

He shook that mental image off quickly.

Nico was coming _here. Now. _Like, at this moment the meeting he thought he had time to prepare for was quickly approaching and going to happen imminently.

"You looked kind of…_not_ happy about that." Percy pointed out to the two boys with their mouths gaping. Remy looked confused, and slightly deflated and hurt at their lack of enthusiasm.

"I-" Peter choked and couldn't find the right words. "I think I have to speak with Chiron." Was all he could say. What was he suppose to do now? It was one freaking _long_ story that had to be told, preferably before Nico got here. And _then_ he had to deal with explaining to the son of the lord of the dead who he was to him… and that was just one _awkward_ conversation ready to happen.

"When's Nico getting here?" Sam asked grimly, and Percy looked alarmed at his tone.

"Uh, sometime today I think. He can be here almost instantly, but he has to wrap up what he's doing now and then he'll be right over."

"We need to speak with Chiron _soon_ then." Sam frowned at Peter's paled expression.

"What's happening? What am I missing?" Remy complained and Percy looked in agreement.

"Why don't you look too stoked to meet Nico?" Percy asked, frowning as well.

"I've already met him." Peter sighed. "But he'll have no clue who I am." Damn Hades for wiping his son's memory… then again, somebody already damned him, so _that'd_ be redundant.

Percy seemed to absorb that for a full five seconds while Remy looked baffled, before his electric green eyes went wide.

"I, uh…" He seemed to be thinking in overtime, and Peter wondered how much he was putting together. "Look, Nico's my cousin, and he's like a brother to me… do you think I could grab Annabeth and we meet you when you talk to Chiron?" Somehow, Peter knew Percy had figured out some of it, and was yet again proven that his initial judgment that he wasn't too bright was wrong. But Percy was a big name around camp, and having him on his side didn't seem like a terrible thing. From what Sam had said of Percy's past adventures, Peter didn't think Percy would doubt him when he tried to explain who he thought he was. He thought Annabeth might, but having Percy and Sam there would help. And if she _did_ decide she believed him, with her reputation as being the smartest person at camp, perhaps she could help him figure it out.

"And Remy's the head of the Apollo cabin; I think he'd be good to have there too." Sam offered to Peter, seeming to follow Peter's train of thought. "It'll help if you need to explain it later…" Peter grasped what he was saying that if he _was_ a son of Apollo, having Remy there with him if he needed to explain his story to his new brothers and sisters would be a big help.

"Ok, I am SO LOST right now!" Remy threw his hands in the air in frustration. Peter liked Remy, and even though he'd only known him an hour, something told him he'd be a good friends to have on your side too. He _wanted_ to tell these people the truth, tell them about him (and he doubted it was Remy's ability, either). It was going to be hard, but he had a feeling the life here was worth it, and it wouldn't do any good to lie about who he thought he was.

"Yeah, I uh… I don't really know, but I'm ok with anyone coming I guess… it's nothing special, just me…" he smiled weakly and Percy smiled back trying to comfort him. Remy sighed in defeat.

"Yeah, sure, I guess I figure out whatever I'm missing. Let's go then." He tried to smile his blinding grin, but Peter could tell something was bothering him. Percy departed to go get Annabeth, and the three remaining started off to the big house.

"I really am glad you found someone to help with your powers though, too." Peter offered to him. Remy's grin was real this time as he flashed his teeth at him. It was like that was all he needed to hear. "Sorry I wasn't too excited for you at first, I guess I'm just going through my own stuff."

Remy waved him off. "Thanks, I get it. Showing up at camp and getting thrown into this life takes time and we've all got issues when we first get here, I understand. It's just… I'm the cabin leader, I'm the 'cool guy', I'm in command a lot, but I have no control over my own powers. I don't know the first thing about dealing with them, and I've waited a long time for the opportunity to sit down with someone and figure it out." He shrugged like him opening up about this was no big deal, but Peter could tell this meant a lot to him. "A lot of people say Nico should have been one of the seven. His powers matched theirs, and he's still going, still finding new things where everyone else has sort of reached their limit so to speak. I've been trying to get one of them to come teach, because, you know, they're big names with their powers now after that quest… but Jason and Piper are off running Camp Jupiter like Percy and Annabeth are here. They sort of do their own thing and focus more on battle skills than their powers. Frank and Hazel have settled in New Rome and aren't interested in either camp anymore though they visit at times, and Leo… ah, well, Leo's a strange bird."

"How so?" Peter laughed, as Sam snickered.

Remy chuckled. "Leo does his own thing. He's a son of Hephaestus, and a fire user—and an incredibly powerful one at that, but he likes to build things, and that's his focus. He's always in the forges and stuff, here or Camp Jupiter it doesn't truly matter to him. When he _does_ use his powers, they're almost second nature to him. He, uh… he says the fire _talks_ to him." Peter raised an eyebrow.

"It's not unheard of!" Sam defended the quirky mechanic. "Fire is a source of life, and a lot of people claim it has consciousness. Hearing what is says could be a talent fire users have!" Remy shrugged like it didn't matter one way or another.

"Still, he'll be the first to admit his powers scare him. Fire users have a long history of being dangerous and unstable with their abilities, and he doesn't trust himself. He doesn't want to lead the sessions because he thinks he needs help as well, though we all know that's not true. We can't talk him out of it. Besides, fire's his specialty, and anything beyond that is basically gibberish to him."

"Not much help for leading abilities training with other kids." Peter concluded and Remy nodded.

"But Nico's specialties vary. He doesn't figure out his own powers, he does research behind everything and figures out the theories behind demigod abilities, and then applies it to what he can do. That's how he can do more than most, and is still growing."

"Wow… that's…"

"Ingenious." Sam said, looking surprised. "I didn't know he did that."

Remy beamed. "Well, no, not a lot of people do, but it's why I was hoping he'd be the one to come and teach us. I've got like, two years on the kid, but I've got a feeling he knows tons more on the subject than I do, than I probably ever will in all honesty."

"How does he do 'research'?" Sam asked.

"The dead." Remy said simply. "He talks to dead demigods who used to have powers, and learns what he can from them. Plus, I heard Hades' palace has a massive library where the ghost council logs the memories of everyone who was ever judged."

"The experiences of everyone in history," Peter said, shocked. "That's a _lot_ of reading!"

"But also a lot of knowledge." Sam pointed out. "Ok, I get why you were happy he's coming to teach."

Again, that ridiculous image of ten-year-old Nico teaching a classroom popped into his mind's eye, and he had to shake his head to get it out.

"Who, might I ask, is coming to teach?" Chiron's voice came from the porch as they came within earshot. He was sitting at a table with a pudgy man playing what looked like cards with little wooden tablets. The other man was wearing a Hawaiian shirt and cargo shorts; he had a puffy, red nose and droopy, bloodshot eyes. Peter got a strong hint of grapes and alcohol on the wind, and immediately recognized Dionysus, the god Sam has told him co-lead the camp with Chiron.

"Nico's coming to lead abilities training!" Remy flashed him a grin and Chiron looked surprised, but pleased.

"That's excellent news!" He returned his smile. "It will be good for everyone, especially Nico himself. It was such a shame he never stayed here long."

"I think he's using this as an excuse to try it out, and see how he likes it here." Percy said, coming up behind Chiron from the opposite end of the porch, Annabeth by his side. "I've only been pestering him to come back for _years_; I think he's actually starting to listen to me."

"_Or_ he's so fed up with your nagging he's coming for a couple weeks just to shut you up." Annabeth offered and Percy shrugged like he'd be ok if that was his reasoning too.

"Why are you all swarming at once? What do you want?" Mr. D snapped, looking incredibly grumpy his game was being interrupted by the onslaught of demigods.

"We need to discuss something with you." Sam told Chiron, and the centaur's eyes locked onto Peter's.

"I presume this was what you avoided yesterday?" And Peter nodded mutely at the old man.

"Do not be afraid my boy, it's probably nothing I haven't heard before." Chiron's eyes twinkled comfortingly.

"Uh, not that I don't think you can help us, but I'm gonna put my money on that this is gonna be a new one, even for you." Sam piped up as he climbed the porch steps and joined them. Peter sighed in dread at trying to figure out how to explain this.

Chiron raised an eyebrow, and the other three not in the know exchanged alarmed looks as well. "That would be quite a feat, but not altogether impossible, I'll admit. Come, let us go inside."

He turned, abandoning his game—which Mr. D didn't look to sad about, so he was obviously not doing well—and lead them into a rec-room. It had a whole bunch of games and stuff, and they all spread out, taking their seats. Peter stood awkwardly for a moment before Sam dragged him over to a couch.

"Now, what is this that you look so terrified to talk about?" Chiron said gently, and Peter gulped.

"I'm just… I'm just terrified you won't believe me. Heck, _I_ might not believe me, I mean, I'm not sure…"

"We don't have any proof." Sam cut in, saving his friend. "But I believe him; we just need to see if there's any other explanation." They all turned and looked at Peter expectantly, who gulped again.

"I, uh… my name is Peter Jaeger, and my parents were Mathilde and Joseph Jaeger." He began quietly. "They adopted me when my mother died in childbirth and my father never stayed. We lived in a small town in southern Germany, until they were killed when I was around twelve." Everyone shared a glance and Peter could tell what they were thinking: _wasn't he twelve or something now?_

He began again before they could ask questions. "I lived on my own, I survived, I did my own thing, until I ended up in Washington D.C. and met two other demigods who took me in and explained that my real father had been Apollo, the sun god and all about the Greek world. That was how I knew mostly about it before I got here."

Now for the hard part… he took a deep breath. "When I was twenty, the building we were in collapsed and everything went dark. The next thing I remember, I was a three year old in the backseat of a car driving through Chicago, looking out at the skyline." Everyone sat up rigidly straight, all looking confused and alarmed except Sam, who silenced Remy—who looked about ready to comment— with a look. Percy was the only one who didn't look too scared, only thoughtful, and Peter focused on him, pretending he was explaining his story to the open-minded, easy-going son of the sea god alone.

"That was the earliest memory I had of this life, of being Cameron Strom. Ever since then I lived my life as Cameron, but at night I'd have dreams of being Peter, only they never felt like dreams, more like memories. I obsessed over them, researching everything I could about the Greek world, which is how I knew so much before even knowing for sure that it existed. Yesterday I was confronted by Lamia, who said this 'second death' would be painless before she attacked us, and I knew my dreams were real. And then, last night-"

He choked, thinking of Bianca, and couldn't speak.

"Last night I brought him up to speed about what' happened around camp and in the Greek World since… since that building collapsed basically." Sam offered, taking over a bit. "The two demigods he met, that he became friends with, he discovered they were real people, people we all know." Everyone sat up.

"But she died." Peter choked out. "Sorry, I just… they were such a vital part of me, even as dreams, and then to discover they were real, and that one of them…" He tried to pull himself together.

"Hey," Percy caught his attention. "I bawled like a baby when people I only half knew died, you don't have anything to be ashamed of."

"You believe me…" Peter stared at him.

"Of course! I've seen stranger things, trust me." His green eyes twinkled brightly, trying to cheer him up just by a smile, and it sort of worked.

"And I think it makes sense." Annabeth cut in, glancing at Chiron who was nodding slowly. "You could be a soul that was only partially washed in the river Lethe… I've never heard of it before, but I assume it's possible." She nodded like that was what she decided to be her theory.

"We were concerned that he was channeling someone else's memories." Sam said. "I'm not a demigod, I don't know how that works…"

"You said they feel like your memories?" Percy asked Peter, who nodded. "Then they are. I wasn't kidding when I said go with your instincts: they can't fail you. Even if you're wrong, who cares? If you believe it, and there's no harm seeing as whoever really was Peter technically died years ago. If you want to be Peter then I'm right there with you. You are officially Peter to me, and that's that." He shrugged like there wasn't any problem, but he didn't know how much that meant to him.

"You'd really, just… let me be…" He glanced around the room and they all shrugged too like they had no problem.

"You can be who you want to be." Chiron said. "Camp Half Blood is meant to be more than just a safe haven; it can be a fresh start too, if you wish."

He was stunned. This was all he ever wanted to hear, and it was just going to happen just like that? No fuss, nothing, no issues at all? It was unbelievable.

"Thank you…" Was all he could manage to get out.

"Wait, wait, wait!" Remy cut in, slightly annoyed. "As nice as that gooey moment was, I still have questions! Like, how did you know you were a son of Apollo before you got to camp if you didn't know your biological mom? And how do you know he's still your dad if that was in a past life?"

"And who were those demigods we all know?" Percy asked.

"I… uh, well, it happened a while ago… I just… ah, well you see-"

"Oh for gods' sake, it was Nico and Bianca." Sam said bluntly, getting it over with. Peter looked at him with wide eyes and he just shrugged like _'yeah, thank me later'._

"Woah," Annabeth tilted her head back as she did the math. "So mentally you're not a kid, you're… thirty two? And then even more technically, you're seventy something if your first life was so long ago… I wonder why the delay…?" She muttered to herself.

Peter hesitated, then nodded. "From what I've gathered, the life of a demigod makes you grow up faster than most childhoods. I didn't even know I was a demigod until seven months before I, uh, died I guess. But now… after twenty years as Peter, and twelve as this new person, with everything that happened in both lifetimes… I _feel_ ninety. I feel tired." He sighed.

"You grew up in World War 2." Chiron said. "It was a stressful time for everyone—weather they knew about the Greek world or not, especially for someone who lived in Germany. I could imagine it was as burdened as a life any demigod who is constantly pursued by monsters could have." Peter nodded mutely, trying not to think about why he was so tired…

"Tell them." Sam commanded his friend, without making eye contact with him, just looking straight ahead. Peter had tried to leave the worst part out, but Sam seemed to sense his reluctance.

"Tell us what?" Remy asked, and Peter gritted his teeth.

"Tell them, or I will. As your new family that just accepted you unconditionally, they have right to know, so suck it up." Sam said pointedly, and in that subtlety rude way that only he could get away with.

Peter exhaled sharply in defeat, and he absentmindedly rubbed the place on his arm where his tattoo had been. "My… adopted parents and I were one of the first people to be taken to the concentration camps. My father died upon entering, my mother roughly a year and a half later." Everyone held perfectly still, as if afraid to even breathe. They didn't know how to react to that.

"We were taken the day after my twelfth birthday, and I didn't escape until I was around eighteen or something. I had no concept of dates then, so it was generally speaking." Percy reached over and grabbed Annabeth's hand, weather to steady her shaking—from fury or sadness he couldn't tell—or settle the worry evident on his own face, it didn't matter.

"I went on my own for a time, stowing away on ships until I hit America. I lived in a small port until there was an attack on Pearl Harbor and the locals stopped being so nice to native Germans, and I traveled to D.C." He started to smile at the memory of the di Angelo kids. "I met Nico, Bianca, and their mother in a park near where I was staying. Nico was ten and the most _annoying_ little twerp ever, but in an endearing kind of way."

Percy burst into laughter, breaking the tense moment. "Ha! Tell me about it! He sure knew how to get on your nerves!" He chuckled while Peter smiled fondly.

"Asking all the wrong questions but saying all the right things you needed to hear." He smiled, remembering, while the others nodded in agreement at that surprisingly accurate description. "They took me in for that time, knowing I had nowhere and a past that weighed a ton, and helped me figure everything out. The morning the hotel… the day it went down was the day they were planning to leave for Italy, and I'd head off to Camp Half Blood. They were my friends… Bianca…" tears welled up again, but he forced them back. "_Bianca_, would slap me silly if she knew I was getting all sentimental over her." He smiled weakly.

"You knew them before," Annabeth said suddenly. "You knew them from a time even _they_ don't remember."

"Which means you know stuff about Nico that he doesn't." Percy put together.

"Woah… I understand why you didn't want to see Nico again." Remy thought aloud. "I'm sure you've heard he's gone Goth and all moody and stuff…"

"He's not the kid I remember." Peter agreed. "Now I'm _younger_ than him technically, and that's just beyond strange. He was like a little brother to me, and now he's a whole new person, a stranger. He won't know who I am…"

"But… he was the one who told you that you were a son of Apollo?" Remy guessed.

"Yes. He just sort of looked at me and could tell. No one doubted him; he had this air of just… _knowing._ I'm really not surprised at all he's coming to teach abilities training, because he was one powerful little kid."

"How so?" Chiron asked thoughtfully, while Remy looked fascinated. Peter explained all the things Bianca had told him that Nico could do without him even realizing and how it worried her.

"But then his memories got wiped, and he had to start from ground zero." Remy concluded. "But he's _still_ a major power… and all that in just five years… now I'm _really_ excited for our first class!"

"He grew up in the Underworld…" Chiron seemed to have a hard time comprehending that. "I just never thought Hades to be so…"

"Caring?" Percy offered. "It sounds like they were both something special… I mean, all of Hades' children are out fighting and dying in the war against Zeus' children, but the di Angelo kids and their mother are safe and sound in the Underworld? Well, as safe as that could ever be. It seems Hades' had a soft spot."

"A soft spot he apparently got over when he locked them in that casino." Peter frowned.

"He put them there to protect them from Zeus, and give them a chance at being champions in the future. Plus, he cursed the Oracle he was so angry they were almost killed! That says something." Percy pointed out.

"I'm just impressed their _mother_ put up with them growing up in the Underworld! I mean, giving birth to and then raising two kids in hell…? That is some serious guts and strength. No wonder Nico's so weird." Annabeth said. As Peter watched Annabeth talk about Mrs. Di Angelo, his felt his brain twitch, like it was trying to remember something he'd long ago forgotten or didn't think important.

"And talented. The things he probably learned, being _raised_ by his dad!" Remy pondered.

"Geez… I never thought _Hades_ of all the gods would be the one to care enough to stay for their kids' entire childhood…" Percy sat back considering that. "I mean, my dad's friendlier than most, and I know almost all our parents are always watching out for us, but that is just _way _beyond strange…!"

"It certainly is peculiar." Chiron frowned. "And not at all healthy if you ask me. Usually, mortals don't handle the idea they'd fallen for a God very well… and to _live_ in their palace, with all that accessible to them, usually they go a bit…"

"Crazy? Full of themselves?" Percy supplied. "My mother didn't, even though she didn't accept the offer to live under the sea with my dad, she still had the option." He defended her.

Chiron smiled warmly. "Your mother is a remarkable woman. She has clearer sight than most, and is very quick on her feet. She had that strength that attracts the gods."

"That fits Ms. Di Angelo to a tee." Peter smiled fondly. Then to Percy, "Sam told me all about your myths. From what I've heard, aside from one or two things, they seem like the same mom, just seventy years apart." Everyone's eyebrows went up.

Percy was suddenly grinning. "No wonder mom's the only one Nico ever listens to!" He chuckled. "I can never get him to come by for dinner or parties, but if mom walks by while I'm on an IM with him, she puts her 'mom voice' on and demands he come over, and he's there the next instant. It's hilarious how responsive he is when I threaten a call from her…" Annabeth rolled her eyes, but Percy looked proud of himself.

"So he does remember some part of her." Chiron said.

"That _would_ be wonderful… it's just that the idea I know more about his mother than he does… it's incredibly depressing." Peter worried, and the others looked equally disturbed by it.

"I got my memories back." Percy volunteered. "Jason did too… but now that I think about it, we both had two whole camps trying to find us and give us our memories back. Nico had his memory wiped long before we did and no one's ever tried to help him." Everyone but Peter looked guilty.

"Perhaps the Oracle came back too soon." Sam muttered, and everyone knew what he meant by that, but didn't acknowledge it.

"We do accept him; he's welcome here anytime." Chiron tried to defend the camp, but only halfheartedly, knowing being allowed here and welcomed with loving arms was two entirely different things.

"Abilities training will help." Remy said confidently. "Once people see what he can do, how he can help…!"

"As a teacher. When did he ever get to be a camper? When did he ever get to be a kid?" Annabeth pointed out, and he fell silent.

"Never." Percy answered her. "Never, not once. The few uncomfortable weeks without Bianca he stayed here as a camper, but other than that… never. My birthday party that I practically had to bribe him with food to attend was the first normal kid thing he ever did, and even then, he was still living on the streets, fighting behind the scenes to avoid the apocalypse."

"He's not a kid though, not really." Sam sighed. "I was a lot younger, but when he stayed here, he was so different from everyone else… he was never interested in other people, and they weren't interested in him. He learned to ignore that and learn a thing or two while he was here… but even if Bianca hadn't died, he wouldn't have stayed here long. With her in the Hunters, he would have been off on his own within days of her return from the quest anyway."

"I like to think everyone can find their place here… but I understand Nico had to find himself elsewhere before making a real attempt at finding a home." Chiron said sadly.

Somehow, Peter didn't think Nico would find his home at Camp Half Blood. He didn't know the new Nico, not really, but his instincts told him Nico wouldn't be staying at Camp forever.

"Whatever his chances here, that's up to him." Annabeth reasoned, not liking the idea anyone would be rejected, especially Nico, who'd she'd come to think of like a brother through Percy and wanting to get away from this topic. "What we should be focusing on now is how to explain this to him when he gets here."

Peter groaned. _This _is the part he'd been dreading the most, though with everyone here willing to stand by him, it wasn't nearly as daunting as it had been half an hour ago.

"We'll take it as it comes." Perch shrugged. "We can't plan it out, conversations never go the way you plan it to, so we'll just go with it when he arrives." Annabeth scoffed.

"You can _too_ plan things! Just because everything _you've _ever planned has gone awry doesn't mean we can't!" She objected.

"Ah! But how many of you were planning on making me tell him?" He challenged the room, and everyone but Peter shifted uncomfortably. Honestly, that idea had never occurred to him, he always thought he'd have to face Nico himself. But in this new life, Percy had become what Peter had been for Nico in his old life, and he supposed sending Percy in first was a pretty smart move. "Ha! There! If you're gonna make me do it, you're gonna have to deal with my tactics." Annabeth practically growled at him, but he was beaming triumphantly.

A conch shell was blasted across the fields and they all looked up.

"Woah, activities are starting!" Annabeth jumped up and dragged Percy behind her. "We got to go! Call us when Nico gets here!" She cried back to Chiron as they disappeared.

"Aw man! We missed breakfast!" Sam moaned and Remy laughed at him.

"Don't you have a Lord of the Wild to report to? I'm sure he's _dying_ to hear how well your first mission went!" He snickered and Sam paled, sitting up strait.

"Crap! I forgot…"

Remy clapped him on the back. "It's ok, I'll take Peter to the Hermes cabin and finish up our tour, you go get ridiculed by the nymphs. Have fun!" He hooked Peter's arm and swiftly swept them out of the house before Sam could react properly and start cussing him out. "Gods he's fun to mess with!" The blonde chuckled.

"I'm going to have to agree." Peter smiled. "What's the Hermes cabin?"

Remy shrugged. "It's where all new campers stay before they're claimed. You're a special case because we're all almost certain you're going to be the in the Apollo cabin with us, but still, _technically_ gods don't have to claim their kids until they're thirteen, and _technically_ you're still twelve."

"So I stay with them until I turn thirteen or I'm claimed?"

He nodded. "Yep. They're a friendly bunch but, uh, if you have anything you don't want stolen, I'd stash it in the forest or somewhere safe."

"Hermes… the god of thieves." Peter concluded and Remy nodded. "What if I'm not a son of Apollo? It's not like that couldn't be the case, we don't _know_ anything, do we?" He pointed out, nerves starting to set in as they approached a low roofed worn-looking cabin they'd pointed out as Hermes' cabin earlier.

"Well then, you have a different cabin, but it's not like I'll never see you again. This camp's gotten pretty big in the past couple years, but we all know each other in one way or another, you're not pigeon-holed into one thing, you can be whatever. I personally think you'll be in Apollo form what I've heard of your archery skills, and then that blessing in getting you healed, but you never know, there have been many good archers from other cabins. A daughter of Aphrodite liking to fight, a daughters of Ares who loves new clothes, a son of Hermes who felt guilty stealing things, a daughter of Demeter who couldn't grow a weed to save her life: I've seen it all. No matter who you are or what you do, you'll find your place." He reassured him.

But Peter couldn't help but worry about the biggest exception to that statement. "Nico didn't."

Remy didn't let it show on his bright face his stress, but Peter could sense it. "Nico… Nico said it himself once: his life reflects that of his father's. Hades isn't accepted on Olympus, and Nico isn't 100% at home at camp. Kids who've run away in the past… they never make it far, you know? I don't want to say it isn't impossible to not find a home here, I'm just saying your choices aren't exactly abundant."

"So I'm basically trapped here?"

Remy shrugged. "No, you _can_ go, no one's going to physically force you to remain in camp, and though there are deterrents, it's not at all _hard_ to leave, but once you're out, the chances you'll make it are… well, not favorable to say the least." He seemed to shake his thoughts away. "But why are we talking about this!? You're a great guy, and you already have me, Annabeth, and Percy on your side, you can't fail! Not saying it's gonna be a cakewalk, but you'll find your place in no time, I'm sure of it."

With that he pushed the smaller boy into the front door of Hermes cabin. Activities had already started, so it was only a couple boys there, but Peter could tell a_ lot_ more kids would be joining them that night. Sleeping bags and spare cots littered the floor, everything was clustered and cluttered, but had a really homey and welcoming feel to it. At the same time, that same welcoming aura had a slightly 'false-sense-of-security' feel to it, and had Peter automatically patting his pockets—though there was nothing in them—just because he felt like nothing he had was perfectly safe.

"Woah, woah, woah! I thought you said he was shredded by the Harpies!" One boy with semi-curly shaggy brown hair and pointed features cried out. The boy next to him looked almost identical except a maybe a bit shorter, and they both seemed to be working on filling a sleeping back with what looked like jello.

"Way to be welcoming Travis. This" Remy sighed, gesturing up and down Peter's body. "is a blessing from Apollo. Broke both his knees too, and he's just fine now. This is Peter Jaeger; Peter, this is Travis and Connor Stoll, the co-counselors of Hermes' cabin."

"How'd ya do?" Connor piped up while Travis scratched his head.

"Kay, so… he fought off a bunch of Harpies with a bow without ever using one before, then got a blessing from Apollo where all his injuries just magically healed overnight… and you're putting him in our cabin? Not that you didn't know this, but we're kinda cramped! Don't ya think he has a bed over with Apollo just screaming his name?"

Remy chuckled. "Yeah, we're setting up a place as we speak, but technically he hasn't been claimed yet, and you know the rules!"

Travis shrugged him off. "Yeah, yeah, I know! Oh well, nice to meet ya Peter, welcome to Cabin eleven! We'll, uh, borrow you some stuff from the camp store for tonight, and until then, we can show you to the activities for the day. The ropes and what not." He clapped him on the back and they all exited the cramped cabin, Conner setting the ruined sleeping bag down carefully so as not to hint that there was anything wrong with it upon first glance.

"So, right now our cabin's at Ancient Greek lessons with Annabeth-"

"Which you two have ditched." Remy pointed out, but they ignored him.

"Then we have some chores, then—what's today, Wednesday?—then Monster assault training, some more book-y stuff I'm sure Annabeth will assign us, lunch, wrestling, more chores, dinner, then free time before the bonfire. You probably won't remember any of that, so just stick with us and we'll point you in the right direction." Connor smiled a bit evilly.

"Don't listen to a word they say." Remy clarified. "They'll direct you off a cliff just as soon as taking you to the dining pavilion, so just follow where the majority of Hermes' cabin is going, and if you lose them, just slip into any activity and they won't mind."

"I'm offended by that statement!" Travis acted outraged.

"Offended, but not at all surprised!" Connor chimed in with the same indignant voice. Peter laughed nervously because it was all too much to take in and he just wanted to shake some of his stress off.

The Stolls (closely watched by Remy) got him to Greek lessons with Annabeth, who beamed warmly at him but didn't make him introduce himself, just kept teaching about punctuation way beyond Peter's skill level. After that they spent an hour picking strawberries—for the "Delphi Strawberry co.", which Peter found hilarious. Then they all moved to a field where an Ares' camper taught them techniques to kill all theses monsters Peter had _read_ about in mythology, but only listening to the buff girl explain precisely how to impale a gorgon did he realize one day he might actually have to face these creatures. The girl quickly realized not to give Peter a sword until he'd gone to at least one sword skill lesson and let him just watch and listen the rest of class. Then Annabeth came around and gave them things to read about Mythology and Malcolm, a son of Athena, basically told stories about past historical demigod battles and all their strengths and weaknesses. _That_ was the first lesson Peter felt like he actually knew what was going on, but he knew knowing this stuff wouldn't help him fight off monsters in the real world. Knowing what was killing you was nice, knowing how to fight it off would be better.

It was going to lunch he accidently wandered too close to the Ares' welcoming committee.

"Newbie!" He heard a gruff voice call as he made his way to where he thought to dinning pavilion was. He'd lost his cabin—who'd gone nuts and took off in a dozen different directions as soon as Malcolm's class let out—and was sort of wandering in search of the large dining area that he'd _thought_ was much bigger and more obviously placed than he was finding it really was. You really shouldn't be able to lose an entire pavilion, it was absurd, and Peter could've _sworn_ his sense of direction was _a bit_ better than it was turning out to be.

Somehow, he didn't think anyone else was still classified and 'newbie' except for him, and he immediately recognized the burly, stringy-haired campers with half laughing growls approaching him. Half of them still had their weapons with them, and the first thing that popped into his mind was that bullies at this camp were worse than those at regular camps because _here_ the counselors willingly hand out swords and axes and teach you how to fight. Practically a breeding-ground for bullies and the hapless bullied.

Peter froze as they swiftly approached, knowing they'd catch up to him sooner or later, and really not wanting to drag this out forever. Best get it over with.

"Heard you got shredded by the harpies… tough luck you know, wussing out your first fight." A burly boy about Remy's height, but infinitely more built taunted. This boy was easily twice Percy's build, but he seemed a bit slow. His pale brown hair was cut short as if by safety scissors, and his plain brown eyes were flat. His cheeks were flushed red from the heat and all of them were sweating, some even still wearing armor, and Peter figured they'd just come from combat training or something like it.

_That's perfect._ Peter thought sarcastically. _Kids of the war god all hopped up on violence… just what I needed. _

"I'll live." He said curtly, not wanting to provoke them, but also not be treated like crap either. Somehow, he knew he wouldn't get far at succeeding at either goal.

"Not a scratch on you! Let me guess, you let salty brains and smart ass handle it for ya, didn't ya? Didn't even lift a finger, you rode in on their coattails." He spat, and Peter could see how a son of Ares' would think not fighting your own battle would be a terrible insult. Peter _was_ insulted, but if he _had_ done as the boy had implied, at least he would have done it because he and Sam would've died if he hadn't. Being a coward was disgraceful and pathetic, but Peter would take it over being the dead hero who let his best friend die with him. Somehow, he didn't think dying a hero's death as they considered it would mean as much if it got others killed with him too.

"If that's what you heard." He didn't want to argue his own story, especially when he didn't think anything his did was all that impressive on the grand scheme of things anyway. They'd probably just laugh at whatever he _did_ do.

"Cut the crap," A girl scoffed, shoving his shoulder roughly trying to 'joke around'. "What _really_ happened? You curl up in a ball and cry over the bird-ladies? Bet that pathetic goat had to drag you across the boundary himself." She shook her head in mock disappointment.

"Leave him out of it." Peter snapped. Insult _him, _not Sam.

"Oh? What you gonna do about it?" Another boy behind the first, but equally as big, jeered.

"Nothing. As you pointed out, I can't fight." Peter quipped. Well, honesty always was the best policy.

"You're more stupid than you look." The girl raised an eyebrow.

"What?" Peter shrugged, trying to attempt a joke and knowing he was failing miserably. "I can shoot a bow, but I'm crap at anything else." Some of them snickered, but he assumed it was because they thought he was pathetic, not because they thought his joking was particularly funny.

"Ok, I'm no son of Athena, but I'm pretty sure you're not supposed to tell us your weaknesses." The boy laughed at him, and the others joined in. Peter looked at all of them, getting so much enjoyment at his expense, and couldn't stop the words coming from his mouth.

"Yeah well, I'm fairly certain none of you are clever enough to actually be able to use it against me." He instantly regretted it and snapped his mouth shut.

"Why you little-!" The boy's arm shot out and Peter only just managed to hop away, out of his reach. Unfortunately, they were quick, and he was soon being restrained by at least four of them. He was pretty sure it would be nothing for only one of them to hold him still, and couldn't help but notice the redundancy of it all.

"The usual Jacob?" The girl asked with a smirked. Peter remembered how Clarisse has tried to give Percy a swirly and was suddenly regretting opening his mouth a whole lot more.

The first boy cocked his head, thinking it over. "Na, that's old school! Let's mix it up a bit… he _did_ say he couldn't fight, so let's give him a little 'on-the-job' training, shall we?" They all began to laugh with a kind of thrill behind it that made Peter uneasy. Anything Ares' kids thought as fun probably wasn't his cup of tea.

"Oh man! I _love_ this part!" Another boy chuckled while the girl ran off.

They moved swiftly, almost carrying Peter, and he wondered briefly why no one around camp stopped them before he realized this probably happened all the time. Suddenly they were outside the forest, and the girl reappeared with two swords, one in each hand. They all entered without a moment's thought, and Peter knew he probably should be fighting this, but not wanting to provoke them any more than he already had, so he just fell quiet.

"Scared, shrimp?" Jacob asked mockingly.

"No, just wondering why a forest is scarier than the camp toilets." He said honestly and they shoved him roughly forward.

"You should be…" He heard him mutter, but he didn't exactly say it to Peter, more to himself. _That_ got him freaked. What would scare a natural born fighter?

After what felt like half an hour or so, they stopped in a relatively clear patch of forest. "Michaela, got it?" One boy to the right of him asked. They pushed Peter forward and the girl stepped up and shoved one of the swords into his hands and put a necklace type thing around his neck. She drew the string tight before he could realize what was happening, and when he tried to yank it off, it held firmly, like it was suddenly a steal wire fitted against his skin. He felt around and it had an alarmingly cold square on it, like a dry, flat ice cube, but it was on him too tight to see.

"A little gift we, uh, _found_." Michaela smirked. "Cost us an arm and a leg, but it was worth it."

"It attracts monsters like flies to honey." Jacob grinned. "_Excellent_ for practice… and pathetic newbies that can't fight."

Peter felt his stomach drop. "Uh, I think I'll take that swirly now!" He panicked and they laughed at him.

"Suck it up! You're on your own now!" A boy hollered and they scattered, darting off into the forest. Peter tried to follow but it was useless. He wasn't half as athletic as any of them; no matter how big and slow they looked.

Then, by the time he realized following them wouldn't work, he was hopelessly lost and couldn't retrace his steps back to camp.

"This is sick." He said to no one. Really, they should just shove his head in the toilet or something typical bullies do, but this was too far. This was risking his life! Then again, once they left camp, they risked their lives every second… but still, at least then they'd have training! He'd had two book lessons and _half_ a monster fighting lesson! That wasn't nearly enough to protect himself now! With a _sword_ no less, which most certainly would help him one bit.

He wondered randomly if they would get in trouble for this. I mean, sometimes kids died in that capture the flag game on Fridays, and chariot races and other casual daily activities. Kids died on quests and field trips out of camp bounds, would his death in an initiating ceremony really be that bad? He supposed Sam might cuss them out and Chiron would say something officially, perhaps Percy or Remy would be put out, but he guessed the Ares' cabin would just get away with it.

After all, they were the children of a violent god, what else did you expect?

"Wonderful." He said, again to no one, trying to figure out which way looked more populated. Where had the sun been in relation to camp when he left? He couldn't remember and it didn't help that the sun was now slowly sinking in the sky, changing his position on the world. He started to feel paranoid as he was sure monsters were flocking towards the stupid medallion on his neck, and every little sound made him jump. He tried to pull the necklace off, but all he managed to do was dig it deeper into his skin, and he decided it wasn't worth it when he felt blood dripping down his neck and his fingers came back red. Trying any harder to get it off would probably just kill him faster than if he let the monsters come and eat him.

Branches started snapping to his left, and he only just began to hear the grumbling of fierce growls when he took off. He just picked a direction that was his best guess as to where camp would be and bolted, running faster than he ever had before. He tried to channel the speed he'd had when Lamia was chasing him but he had no clue if it was working.

The forest was being plowed down behind him as more and more creatures joined the hunt, and many pairs of feet or claws or whatever could be heard pounding into the soft earth. Peter stumbled briefly on a root or something and the sword in his hand went flying.

He really should learn to hold his weapons better.

Branches whipped by and scratched his face, making it harder and harder to see, so it was more than a little surprising when something collided with the force of a small car into his side.

The breath was knocked clean out of him and he hit the dirt hard. He couldn't get his breath back though, when something easily five hundred pounds leaned down on his chest. He could feel his ribs snapping, his chest being crushed nearly flat, but couldn't even inhale enough to scream.

A hellhound bared its teeth down at him, its blood red eyes sparking murderously, and its growls ripping through the forest and deafening Peter's ears to anything else. Its massive front paws were both somehow on top of his chest, its claws sinking a few inches into Peter's skin, and for the second time in two days, Peter felt blood running freely over his newly opened flesh.

The next second he'd be ripped to pieces and he'd be eaten alive his first day of camp. Peter was mentally preparing for his second death when the hound suddenly disappeared. It didn't burst into golden dust, it was like it was sucked backwards and just vanished. Like it became a shadow that was vacuumed up.

In a panic at his almost-death and certainty that there were a dozen other monsters nearby, Peter sat up and gasped at the pain in his chest. He forced himself to ignore it and found himself looking at the back of a boy about the same height as Percy with pitch black hair. He held a black sword in his hand, at the ready in a fighting stance, and Peter managed to break out of his shock and look past him enough to see the seven or eight other hellhounds pacing in front of the two boys. They were accompanied by three half snake, half leopard type things, and about five creatures that looked vaguely like rhinos except with spiked, navy blue and green armored plates covering them.

The boy was standing perfectly still, blocking Peter from the horde of monsters. He felt his throat close and his heart dropped into his stomach when he recognized the old WWII aviator jacket he wore.

Nico lurched forward with alarming speed and slashed at the nearest hellhound, who burst into black partials that were then sucked into his eerily pitch black sword, which itself seemed to suck in the light around it along with the monster bits. The other monsters fidgeted nervously before launching themselves at him. He caught them easily on their underside and slashed and jabbed faster and faster as they swarmed. A snake/leopard thing jumped at Peter and Nico slid easily between them and sent it scattering with one quick swipe. Peter tried to stand to help, but he was too stunned, and the pain in his chest wasn't making it very easy to breathe.

The monsters wouldn't give up, despite how skilled Nico seemed to be at fending them off, and both boys noticed when a thunder of paws could be heard circling around them, hidden in the nearby forest. Nico straitened and did a quick three sixty, and his eyes widened. Peter didn't need to be a genius to know they were surrounded.

Nico scoffed in frustration and plunged his sword into the ground with enough force to bury it to the hilt. A shock wave of what seemed to be shadows rippled out from where it imbedded itself into the ground that threw Peter a good six feet back, even though he was lying on the ground, and he nearly bit his tongue out upon landing. He hit the ground again and couldn't stop the yelp that escaped his lips as his chest seized with agonizing pain once again. He had to shut his eyes tight as the pain made him tear up uncontrollably, and the shock wave sent a cloud of dust over him. The monsters exploded into golden dust, and the forest fell perfectly silent once again. Even the birds were too stunned by the shock wave to make a noise.

Peter's eyes snapped open again when he felt icy fingers touching the side of his neck.

"Wha-!" He gasped, jumping a little when he saw Nico crouched over him.

"Ares cabin… the bastards…" The pale boy muttered, preoccupied, and Peter realized he was looking at the pendant still fastened around his neck. He muttered something unintelligible, and the necklace came off with a snap. Peter saw as Nico examined it in him long pale fingers, that the square was crystal clear, and glowing a slightly orange-yellow color. "They ditched you?" He asked, and Peter would've responded if he wasn't so shocked.

"_Nico!"_ He managed to gasp, and winced at the pain breathing brought.

Nico raised a wary eyebrow. "Do I know you?" Peter's eyes were the size of saucers. Great, now he had to explain this to him, all thanks to the Ares' cabin… and he couldn't even _breath _properly to even know where to start.

"We've met… once before…" He would have gone farther, but the pain in his chest was unbearable. He coughed and he tasted blood on his lips. His body spasmed, trying to reject the unendurable pain the action of coughing up blood brought his ribs.

"Hmm…" Nico seemed to study him for a moment. "Come on, we need to get you back to camp." He slipped one arm underneath Peter's shoulder blades and pulled him into the sitting position. He wrapped one of Peter's arms around his shoulders, holding it there, and lifted with surprising strength until they were both standing, and he could wrap his other hand around the injured boy's waist. Nico was still a lot taller and had to bend down some as Peter was practically lifted off the ground, supported mainly by the taller boy.

Peter inhaled sharply at the pain, but that only made it ten times worse and his knees gave out. Nico wouldn't let him fall though, and dragged him a few steps forward.

"Come on, you have to keep moving, you'll feel better the more you walk, I promise." He said firmly, with no sympathy, but Peter couldn't even breathe to respond. Still- as always- he had a feeling Nico knew what he was talking about, and forced himself to take steps that matched Nico's and ignore the fact he couldn't breathe or the screaming agony in his chest. Nico went slowly at first, giving Peter a chance to get into the rhythm of walking again, but then gradually sped up until they were walking at a normal pace, and every time Peter stumbled, Nico kept on dragging him like nothing was wrong.

"So… where have I met you before?" Nico asked conversationally, pointedly ignoring Peter's distress and pretending everything was ok.

Peter could think of a lot of ways to break who he was to him, and a lot of _nice_ ways at that, but he was kind of ticked off at the moment that he was practically dying here, and Nico was ignoring that and acting like everything was normal. He was in too much pain to think things through, or to fully take in that _this_ was the little boy he'd thought of as his younger brother, because _this_ boy was kind of a jerk. Peter was angry at everything: the Ares' cabin, the monsters, and now Nico being an ass, so he just let it slip frankly.

"I was… staying with you… and Bianca… in the Hotel… that your mother died in…" He tried to say it quickly and bluntly, to make an impact, but had to stop periodically and painfully catch his breath.

Nico tensed until the hand wrapped around Peter's waist to support him actually hurt, but he never stopped walking. Slowly, as it sunk in, he relaxed some. His face remained perfectly blank the entire time.

"Oh." Was all he said. "You're older than you look, I could see than right away, I just didn't…"

"How… how old… do I look?" Peter panted.

"Ninety. Eighty nine to be exact… you're an old soul in a young body. It looks weird, and I guess that's what led me to find you so easily… that, and this pendant and every monster in the area suddenly converging on one spot…" Nico frowned, thinking it over.

"You can… see… my soul?" Peter asked, incredulous.

"Oh, I can see a lot more than that. I can see you're telling the truth about who you are, and I can see that soul of yours has been put through the ringer. I can also see you're a son of Apollo and you have healing abilities."

"Woah, woah, woah… I'm a son of… Apollo?" Peter piped up.

Nico nodded absentmindedly. "Yes… but you're unclaimed. And you have the ability to heal yourself and others… but I guess you didn't know that yet."

"That's… well, that explains…a lot." So Nico could see people's souls… well, that explained how he knew so much so easily: souls are the essence of people. They couldn't lie, so Nico always saw the truth. It also comforted him greatly that he really _was_ a son of Apollo. That took one more uncertainty out of his future.

"You don't seem too surprised." Nico commented.

"Neither do you. I thought… you'd flip or something… I don't know, it just seems like… it should be harder… to explain this to you." Nico thought that over.

"I've seen a lot of surprising things. I _have_ heard of a soul only partially being washed in the River Lethe, but I've never seen one with my own eyes before. I look at you, and that seems to be the only explanation for what I see." He glanced down at Peter. "It's easier to think things through logically, rather than emotionally. I believe I could've known you in the past, but I don't remember, and I don't know who you are to me. I know someone's probably explained all about my memory loss to you because you don't seem too offended I don't recognize you. I'd rather just form a new friend than try and figure out an old one." He frowned again, like he was thinking hard, and looked forward again.

"So… you want to just start over? Like… 'Hi I'm Peter Jaeger, what's your name?' kind of thing?"

"Yeah pretty much. Hi Peter, I'm Nico." He smiled dryly and Peter was baffled.

"What the hell happened to that annoying little kid I know and love?" He blurted out before he could stop himself.

"Long gone." Nico snipped a bit sharply. "He grew up, and I'm here now."

"You couldn't be more different."

"Well, that's why starting over is the best option. Whoever I was back then, they don't exist anymore, so you might as well make acquaintances with a whole new person."

"A stranger." Peter frowned, and Nico seemed to grimace a little.

"Yeah, pretty much."

Peter could sort of understand that… Nico had no connection to his old life, and a completely new personality, which technically made him a completely new person no matter if he was physically in the same body as seventy years ago. Peter was worried about reuniting with Nico—his old friend—but in reality, he was just _meeting_ this Nico, which he would have to make friends with just like he did with Remy or Percy.

"How are you feeling?" Nico asked suddenly, and Peter realized he had stopped supporting almost all of his weight. He glanced down at himself and though his shirt was all bloodied, the cuts themselves were scabbed over and nearly healed. The pain in his chest had receded so it was like a constant sharp ache in every one of his ribs, but he could breathe shallowly and have no issues. He was so caught up in talking to Nico he hadn't even noticed himself getting better.

"Ok… what's going on?" He asked, standing up strait and stepping away from Nico. He didn't even need his support anymore, and could walk just fine on his own if they went a bit slower than they had been. He touched his chest to make sure the healed cuts were real.

"I did mention you had healing powers." Nico reminded him.

"But… but this is _unreal!_ I just… I got shredded by those harpies when I showed up at camp, but I thought it was a blessing from Apollo!" He cried, and Nico smirked.

"Nope, it's all you. Course, you got it from your dad, so thanks to him is still due. But it seems like monsters are going to have a really hard time killing you once you get it under control." He seemed delighted he was right about forcing them to keeping walking, and Peter tried not to be annoyed with his smug look.

"No need to be a know it all." He grumbled, and then louder he said, "But, I didn't even know I was doing it!"

Nico chose to ignore the first part of that. "That's how most powers start: subconsciously. A lot of demigods live their whole lives without ever knowing they have powers. In fact, most do."

"So, they just die and no one ever knows?"

Nico nodded. "Yep, pretty much. That's one of the reasons I'm here actually…"

"To teach abilities training?" Peter clarified and he looked questioningly at him. "Percy told me about it."

"Ah, course he did." He looked up and through the forest as if someone had called his name. "Speaking of, they're probably looking for you by now."

"Do they know you're here?" Peter asked as they set off again, Nico still guiding them through the forest but going slower to accommodate Peter's slowed, limping pace. Now that he got Peter to understand that he had to soldier on until he healed, he seemed fine with making allowances for his injuries. At least now Peter was pushing himself, rather than Nico forcing him along.

"No, I shadow traveled into the forest. I usually touchdown in places away from main camp because with places like Camp Half Blood or Camp Jupiter, you never know what you're going to step into the middle of. I couldn't help but notice though, that as I approached camp there seemed to be this kind of light… that turned out to be this."

Peter glanced over and saw him holding the pendant again.

"You saw that as you shadow traveled?" Peter was alarmed.

Nico nodded, lost in thought again. "A lot of monsters travel by the Shadow World. As the name implies, it's very _dark_ there, and this thing," He brandished the necklace, "was like the only source of light _anywhere_. In an entire world of darkness, one speck of light is quite visible. It was like a beacon saying 'come and investigate!' and I'll admit I fell for it too. I could see it was in Camp Half Blood, but I also knew almost every monster who could see it was coming to investigate too. I was curious, and then I landed and all those Ares campers running away…. Well, I asked one for directions and they lead me right to you."

"And they helped you? Just like that?" Peter said skeptically.

"Just like that. I had to ask _nicely_ of course, but once we reached an understanding they were more than helpful. That odd soul of yours was like another beacon in _this_ world that made finding you even easier after that. Plus all that growling…"

"The rest is history." Peter frowned. "How the Hades did Ares' cabin get something like that? Something that can be seen in two worlds?"

"The Hecate cabin is supposedly really good with their magic, but even Lou Ellen couldn't muster up the juice to create something like this." Nico looked worried. "The Shadow World… people shouldn't be messing with it. There's something really wrong if campers are trying to use trinkets to control it." Something in the way Nico's eyes lit up with a sort of controlled fury stopped Peter from asking why.

Peter noticed Nico looked very old when he was worried. Heck, he looked aged and worn no matter what expression he had on. There were dark purple circles under his eyes, and his skin was so pale it was pretty much gray; he might as well have been a breathing corpse. His hair looked recently cut, cropped above his ears, but still slightly shaggy and sticking up in a dozen different directions, like he'd just rolled out of bed after a sleepless night of tossing and turning. His eyebrows and lashes were the same pitch black as his hair, and against his ashen skin, looked like they'd been painted on with black ink. He wore a plain black t-shirt, gray skinny jeans, and thick black army boots. The tattered and beaten up black and gray aviator jacket he'd always wore actually fit him now that his shoulders had gotten broad, and his arms filled out with muscle. Not Ares' cabin muscle, but somewhere between Remy and Percy's build. Not to mention the fact he was probably an inch or two taller than Percy, meaning he simply towered over Peter, which was really strange in Peter's mind. All the childish features he'd had were gone, his jaw line strong, all baby fat vanished and leaving him with a slightly thin, hollowed out look. He looked tired and stressed, but still expressionless and strong. Everything about him looked worn and shabby, from his drained eyes to his tattered clothes, making him seem ancient. He looked like he could completely understand how tired Peter felt.

He really was a different person.

"You look beat." Peter commented, and Nico chuckled under his breath.

"Everyone says that. I guess it's worse at the moment 'cause I just used up whatever energy I had left in getting rid of those monsters." He sighed heavily. "Training in the Underworld, using my powers, constantly fighting off monsters… I guess it takes its toll." He rubbed his eyes and pinched the bridge of his nose.

"You look gray. You need more sun." Peter fretted, feeling suddenly like Bianca.

Nico smirked. "Says the son of the sun god. I suppose spending so much time in the Underworld and the Shadow World isn't doing much for my complexion." He joked and Peter laughed reluctantly. "Ah crap… Percy's gonna make me do something outdoorsy isn't he? Gods, he won't let it rest…" He shook his head in frustration, but he was smiling fondly at his cousin. Peter felt a pang in his heart at the reminder that Percy was what he had been to him all those years ago.

"He's _so_ excited you're coming. He's the most childish 19-year-old I've ever met." Peter grinned.

"Course he is, that's part of his annoying charm." Nico returned the grin.

"Plus, other demigods with powers are just over the moon someone's coming to help them, especially Remy."

"Remy…" Nico thought back. "From the… Apollo cabin?"

Peter nodded. "Cabin counselor. He doesn't talk about it much, but he's more excited than anyone that he might finally get control over his powers."

"Counselor…? That's right, I suppose Will moved on… Med school I think." Nico shrugged. "I _hope_ I can help. I guess I know a lot, but my powers aren't anything compared to Percy or Leo…"

"Percy's teaching sword skills, and Remy said Leo was afraid of his powers and thinks he needs help too." At that, Nico burst into laughter.

"Leo doesn't need my help!" He chuckled. "But if he wants to come to my classes, he's more than welcome! He's a riot, and I'd love to figure out how his powers work…" He got a calculating look on his face, and Peter got a feeling these classes would be for Nico's benefit just as much as everyone else's.

"So wait, does this mean I get to come to abilities training too? Since apparently I have powers I don't know anything about?"

"Yeah sure, why not? Technically, any demigod could participate. All demigods have natural fighting reflexes and heightened senses, so anyone wanting to sharpen them up could come too."

Peter studied him. "You don't seem…_reluctant_ or anything towards teaching us. Percy said he's been bugging you forever and you were dragging your heels to come teach… why the change of heart?"

Nico shrugged. "It's not the idea of teaching people older than me, or even teaching itself—in fact, I'm really excited. Usually I work with dead demigods about their powers, and now I get to see them in life and watch the way they grow. Scientifically speaking, this is the greatest observation opportunity I'll ever get. Getting involved and working with them, well, I could feasibly learn more teaching here than anywhere else, and that's just awesome."

Peter couldn't help but notice Nico's logical way of thinking about this, like the campers were projects for him, and this was all just one big experiment he was doing to learn something.

"I dragged my heels because I felt once I started here, I'd be trapped." He continued. "I mean, I can't stay forever, I have responsibilities and things to do in the Underworld, duties at Camp Jupiter, though, I guess that's lessened now that there are others commuting between the two camps more. Working one summer with one group of demigods… it doesn't seem fair, does it? And to learn anything of value, it's gonna take a lot longer and a lot more work than they can get to in one summer, or the couple weeks I can stay. I feel like I'm going to start something that I might have to leave unfinished, and that bothers me. I want to be here for the long haul or not at all, but it doesn't seem like I'm going to get either option."

"What do you have to do in the Underworld that's so important?" Peter wondered aloud. Nico pursed his lips, and Peter knew he was going to get an edited answer.

"I'm the Ghost King, I have control over most ghosts… but also the responsibility to take care of them too. Like, the obligations they have, where they go after judgment, if they stay there forever or just for a time... plus I'm involved in other stuff, like the Underworld layout itself."

"It changes?" Peter cut in.

"Constantly. They're called the _fields_ of Asphodel and the _fields_ of Punishment because there are thousands, and they move around under the earth pretty much continuously. Sometimes there are problems, sometimes souls get misplaced… just _everything_ that goes on, I have the responsibility to help when I can."

"Because of the title of Ghost King?"

Nico hesitated, and then shrugged but continued. "King Minos was the old Ghost King, and he had no problems because he himself was a ghost. Being alive makes the job harder, though I can shadow travel and that makes it a bit better. It'd be near impossible if I couldn't. When I die, my soul will join the council and I can be the Ghost King fully."

Peter's eyes widened. "Wow… that's…"

"Well, it's nice to know what I'll being doing for all eternity." Nico shrugged.

"And you just chose that? Over Elysium and everything?"

Nico gritted his teeth. "Elysium… well, Elysium and Asphodel and all that, I'm trying to make that system better. It's sort of my… _project, _my goal if you will… I made a deal with my father and a few other gods to try and sort it all out, but basically, giving up Elysium was part of that deal. And being on the council isn't a bad thing, it's helping people. Now I have the chance of getting more people out of Asphodel who don't deserve it, and into something better."

Peter's jaw dropped. "Wait, what's so important you'd give up your afterlife?"

Nico looked pointedly anywhere but Peter's shocked gaze. "Not discussing it was also part of the deal." There was finality in his voice that told Peter he would probably never know.

"NICO!" Peter looked up and realized they were about ten feet from the edge of the forest, Camp Half Blood stretched out beyond that. Despite them being semi-covered in forest, it didn't stop Percy's eagle eyes from spotting them.

No sooner did they step out of the trees did Percy, followed by Annabeth at a slower jog, come screeching to a halt in front of them.

"Nico! And… Peter! Who's once again covered in blood…" He seemed dazed to see Peter with him, but quickly got over it and wrapped his little cousin in a bear hug.

"Argh-! Get uff uhv me!" Nico fought his way out of Percy's hug and tried to regain his breath. "Jeeze! I _just_ talked to you in an IM this morning!" He complained, but smiled at his friend anyway.

"Yeah, but I never get to _see_ you! Like, here in the flesh! Good to see ya!" He beamed and Annabeth rolled her eyes and greeted Nico too.

"You ah… met Peter already." She pointed out, and Percy got pulled up short in his excitement.

"Yes, we've met. More than once I hear." Nico smiled calmly, and Peter smiled too, showing that everything was ok.

"Oh…" Percy's eyes were wide, but he shook it off and grinned. "Perfect! Everyone friends? Excellent! Uh… Peter, why is it every time I see you, you have blood all over you?" Peter glanced down at himself and saw his cuts were gone, but his shirt was indeed very, very bloody.

"Fashion statement." He said seriously, and Nico and Annabeth laughed while Percy looked baffled.

"Not very hygienic, is it?" He shrugged off his confusion and laughed too.

"Actually, I found him being ripped apart by a hellhound, which is _quite_ the way to make a first impression." Nico nodded his approval, and Peter blushed.

"Hey! I've had _one _monster training class! _Half_ of one actually, because they made me sit out when they realized I was rubbish with a sword!" He defended himself and Annabeth looked skeptical while Percy just laughed along with Nico.

"For someone who was eaten by a hellhound, you look just fine." She said critically.

"Well, Peter here will be joining me in abilities training." Nico said semi-smugly—making Peter sigh heavily—and clapped him on the shoulder.

"You have powers?" Annabeth perked up, interested.

"_Apparently_ I can heal myself." Peter said, glancing at Nico who nodded.

"And others." He corrected knowledgably.

"Woah, so yesterday, with the harpies, Apollo didn't bless you and Sam, you just… fixed yourselves?" Percy tried to think it out.

"Well, as I said earlier, he _is_ a son of Apollo, so thanking Apollo is still probably a good idea." Nico pondered.

"And you _know_ he's a son of Apollo?" Annabeth said, even more skeptically at him. Nico smirked, sensing the challenge.

"It's a long explanation, but yeah, yes I do."

"Oh gods," Percy muttered and pulled Peter away from the two. He pulled him along, heading towards the big white house where they'd met Chiron; Annabeth and Nico were suddenly talking quickly back and forth, following a distance behind them. Percy leaned down and muttered to Peter as they walked. "They can go on _forever._ That was Annabeth's '_I'm-the-expert' _ face, if you missed it, and when she puts that on, just shut up and walk away, or play dumb, or _anything_ and you might live. Nico's the only one stupid enough to talk back to her, and _then_ things get ugly."

"I don't know, Nico seemed pretty smart too. I'm sure he could hold his own in an argument against her." Peter shrugged, glancing back at the two curiously.

Percy waved that off. "It isn't an argument per say, because no one doubts what Annabeth says, not even Nico, it's the fact that Nico knows things she doesn't. Nico has more access to resources to learn stuff, and more access to the world in general. Annabeth's freakin' brilliant, but Nico has specialties even she doesn't understand, and it ticks her off. It bugs her he's always learning things she never knew existed. That's also why I'm ninety percent sure she's gonna show up at abilities training, just to be in the loop with what Nico knows."

"Huh… competitive much?" Peter thought aloud and Percy almost laughed before he caught himself.

"Uh, yeah… I'm just not gonna comment for fear of what she'll do to me later if I agree with you. I'm pretty competitive myself, and I'd _never_ just let her win… but her losing makes _everyone_ sleep with one eye open." He shivered and Peter burst into laughter. He could totally see it being a problem when things don't go as Annabeth planned them.

"She seems familiar." Peter thought aloud, really to himself rather than Percy. "I don't know what it is, but every time she talks, or I see her do something… I don't know, I just have a feeling she's really familiar somehow."

Percy rolled his eyes. "Good gods, _please!_ Annabeth can't be from the 40's too! Nico, Bianca, Hazel, You… geesh, when's it gonna end?" He joked and Peter laughed as well.

"I don't think I've _met_ her, but someone like her. I just can't put my finger on it."

Just then, they arrived at the big house, Chiron reading a book on the front porch, and raised an eyebrow at the four of them as they approached.

"I see Nico spent no time in getting into it with Annabeth." He noted calmly, and the turned to Peter. "I heard the Ares' cabin caught up with you. I expected you to be wet, not bloody." He gestured to his second shredded shirt on two days.

"Uh… apparently they got some new tricks." He edged. Was it right to rat on them? It was unfair, but there had to be some sort of code amongst campers, and Chiron _did _fully expect the "Ares' welcome" for all new-comers, so would they even get in trouble if he did speak up?

"New trick my ass." Nico said, breaking off from his conversation with Annabeth mid-sentence, and she looked put out. "Chiron, look what they put on him." He pulled the pendant from his pocket and tossed it to him. The centaur caught it easily and examined it for a moment, then his eyes widened.

"It can't be…" He muttered, turning it over in his palm.

"But it is." Nico said grimly. "It only works when it's next to a pulse, so it shouldn't be a problem for now… I'm just worried how campers got their hands on it, and if they've been keeping it here _in_ the camp for that long..."

"What is it?" Percy asked, and Nico explained what the pendant did. "So… it's just a big monster magnet?"

"Yep, pretty much. If I hadn't been traveling in the shadow world to see it myself, I would never have even known Peter was in trouble, and powers or no, he would be dead." Peter felt his stomach drop. THAT was a comforting thought. "The swirlys or whatever are stupid, but they seem to be a rite of passage so I can't really argue. But _this_ is a bit too far, even for camp. If it'd been anyone but Peter, they would be long dead, and systematically killing off new campers probably isn't the best idea."

Chiron considered that. "I'll deal with the Ares' cabin, and we will discuss this troubling matter later."

"Troubling matter…" Percy muttered. "Haven't we had enough 'troubling matters' to last us a lifetime?" He sighed, and Annabeth rolled her eyes.

"As for now, let us discuss this new class you will be teaching." The worry in Chiron's eyes lessened some, giving way to a delighted twinkle in his eye.

"Yes! Abilities training!" Percy cheered, and Nico rolled his eyes.

"Come on, let's get you cleaned up." Annabeth offered Peter, as the other three headed into the big house. He watched Nico go a bit reluctantly, but turned with her anyway. She seemed to get what he was thinking, and let them walk in silence until they were almost to the infirmary.

"So…" Peter thought aloud as they walked, and Annabeth looked down at him curiously. "Nico can tell I'm a son of Apollo. Is that enough proof to get me into the cabin, or do I still have to stay with Hermes' cabin?"

Annabeth looked forward, surprised and calculating, thinking it over. "Well, that's an interesting debate… but I don't think we'll get that sorted out by the time you turn thirteen. When's your birthday?"

"April." He said glumly. He still had the entire year to wait.

"Hey," She tried to cheer him. "We all _know_ Apollo's your dad, and he _could_ claim you _before_ you're thirteen. It does happen." He sighed heavily at the ground. "It's just… well, there was never a method to tell who your parent was except by being claimed, and there isn't a _rule_ or anything saying otherwise… but the gods might get a bit ticked if Nico just walks into Hermes' cabin and tells everyone who their parents are. I mean, they were pissed when Percy forced them into their current deal about claiming kids when they were thirteen, and especially…" She trailed off.

"Especially because it's Nico. Because it's a son of Hades." He finished rather sharply for her. She bit her lip.

"…Yeah. Because it's Nico." She looked defeated and concerned. He had another feeling that she was acting very familiar. Just her expression, and the look in her eyes….

"That's crap." Peter spat. "To be treated… and just because of who you are…" He was at a loss for words.

Suddenly, he was walking through a desolate court yard, pale ghosts wandering around him with depressed, hopeless expressions. His clothes didn't fit, he was so hot and so parched, but with no water to make the sweat needed to cool him down. The ache in his chest was from dire hunger, and exhausting work at shoveling ashes from the furnaces onto trucks. His lungs burned fiercely from inhaling what was left of people. His skin ached to the touch where he was beaten by guards, for no other reason than that they thought he was Jewish. He felt so alone, and just as depressed and hopeless as all the faces not making eye contact with anyone; all the faces of the people who really were Jewish, and were left here to rot and die away when they were of no use anymore. All because of who they were.

He felt tired and hungry and frustrated and hopeless. He felt so alone.

"Peter!" Annabeth's voice was suddenly the foremost thing in his mind.

He was kneeling on the ground in the middle of Camp Half Blood, his hands limply lying in his lap, the few campers who'd heard Annabeth yelling looking curiously over at them. She was crouching before him, shaking his shoulders roughly to jerk him out of his daze.

"Peter!" She gasped again, seeing the life come back to his eyes. "What happened? Are you ok?"

"I…" He mumbled. What had happened? That wasn't a memory; it was like he was living it. It was like he really _was_ right back in that camp, trapped and alone.

Fear gripped him, worse than anything he'd ever felt before. It was a thousand times worse than watching a harpy skewer Sam, a million times worse than lying under a hellhound. It was so powerful his mind went blank and his only thought flooding him brain: _escape._

He wouldn't go back. Never. They'd have to find a way to kill him first.

He flung himself away from Annabeth and bolted. She was so surprised, and he was moving so fast, he was gone before she collected herself. He didn't care about monsters this time; he went straight for the forest and didn't pause until he couldn't run anymore.

He literally collapsed, tripping slightly over something, but instead of regaining his step, his legs gave out and he hit the dirt. He scrambled up, flipping onto his back, so he was facing the way he'd come, and crawled back a few feet until his body screamed at him to stop. He flopped back, staring up into the canopy, his chest heaving as his lungs tried to catch up with him. He must had run full-out for hours, but it flashed by like seconds.

He couldn't bear to think, so he let him mind go blank, staring only at the leaves high above.


	5. May 27th, 2015

Something was suddenly beside him.

It's suddenly materialization was enough of a shock to break him from his deep reverie, but not enough to make him show it. He didn't even blink.

It was unnaturally still and gave off no sound or warmth; in fact, it was slightly chilling to have beside him, like it was actually absorbing all the noise and heat from the air. That should probably register as an 'evil' or 'dangerous' vibe to him, but he honestly couldn't care.

His eyes moved slowly to his right, and he was only dully surprised to see Nico sitting cross-legged in the grass beside him, also looking up at the stars visible through the gaps in the canopy.

Night had fallen long ago, but Peter was unaware of time.

His senses were muted over; like they were a mile underwater and it took a few minutes for anything to reach him. Even his feelings were like thoughts he didn't care about rather than true emotions. His limbs and chest were heavily weighed down with a luke-warm blanket of something he didn't even try to understand. He felt nothing as he gazed at his old friend.

"You missed dinner and campfire, _again."_ Nico said matter-of-factly. "Which means you haven't eaten since before you arrived at camp... Not that I'm an advocate for camp, but even I admit the food here's pretty good."

Peter blinked dully at him. He didn't feel hungry. He felt nothing.

"You could stay like this forever, you know." Nico said in that same conversational tone, perfectly content with this one-sided conversation. "I've seen it happen… _depression,_ in demigods, can be so much worse than a bloody death in so many ways." He started plucking the grass from the ground where they sat. Peter noted in the back of his mind that he could only see Nico's glowingly pale face and hands. His clothes and hair seemed to melt into the shadows, so that if Peter really cared to look hard enough, he'd have a tough time separating the boy from the shadows.

"It latches onto anything. Anything and everything. I've only ever seen it in old demigods. _You_—by many decades—are the youngest I've ever seen." He looked around the forest, his eyes narrowing slightly at the trees. "But you're not young, are you? You're eighty nine. You _feel_ eighty nine, and with good reason. _Usually_, I sit here beside them and offer them peace as they give up on living. I mean, they would sit there until a monster came or they starved to death, and at least I could take their souls right to the Underworld and skip the painful part. _Not_ that they'd feel it anyway." He looked critically down at the lifeless boy.

"But that puts them in Asphodel. If they give up, they go to Asphodel, and then they get to be depressed, emotionless, memory-less, thoughtless ghosts for all eternity. This," He gestured up and down Peter. "Is like dying before you get there."

Somehow Peter knew he should be scared, but he couldn't really give a crap. He tuned the pale boy out: he was interrupting his peaceful nothingness.

"_Usually_ I don't help them come back, because they've lived full lives and fulfilled their part in the world for their lifetime. _Usually_ it's better for everyone that way." He sighed like he found this all a bit trifle. "I think I'll make an exception." He reached up and cupped Peter's face with his icy hand.

It was like he'd been electrocuted, and pain shot through every cell in his body; his brain burned like someone had poured acid into his skull. A scream tore through his lips and his back arched against the ground, his fists clenching, trying to reject the pain.

The pain made everything so clear it hurt; it was like staring into the sun. He could see every detail of both his lives like he was living every moment at the same time.

Everything came back: the exhaustion, the hunger, the fear, the tears, the cold, the pain… but also things like the exhilaration, the happiness, the joy, the drive, the warmth, the laughter. It was so overwhelming, so much, his felt tears streaming down his face, and they were warm against the chilly night air. He couldn't tell if they were from pain, sadness, relief or joy.

He sat up roughly, and grasped his head between his knees, yelping at the pain and ecstasy that still rocked through him, so miserable and elated at the same time.

"Sorry 'bout that… bit of a rush isn't it?" Nico said lazily, and Peter spun and punched him as hard as he could on the shoulder. "Ow! What did I do?!" He cried. "That's it, you're emotional and I'm not dealing with this." He stood swiftly and paced away from him. Peter didn't watch him go, still cringing at everything going on in his head.

"What did you do to me?!" He gasped, as Nico wandered around the trees, taking in the night like a tourist casually examining paintings in a museum. He paused and his eyes narrowed into the darkness again, but he answered normally.

"Jump start. Reminding you about what you forgot."

"You said…" Peter tried to take in what Nico had told him before, when he was only half listening. "You said usually you let people just die…" Nico shrugged, and turned slowly, seeming to not want to tear his eyes away from whatever he was looking at in the darkness.

"Yes, as I said, depression is a natural progression of demigod life. One of them at least. Usually they die in battle or a surprise monster attack when they're forty or fifty and have out-grown their prime to be able to fight back, but if they live long enough, they just…"

"Give up." Peter finished. "That's terrible…"

Nico pursed his lips. "That's the way life goes. It's rare though, demigods just don't live that long. They have to be way up there in years, approaching a hundred or so, and that's if their bodies don't wear out first. Whatever drive that keeps them going through their harder-than-average lives just craps out at one point."

"I'm approaching a hundred." Peter pointed out, finally looking up once the pain in his head receded enough to allow him to operate properly again. "You said I'm technically eighty nine or something."

Nico grimaced. "Which was what had me worried about this… your soul is approaching the point where it's just gonna give out, like it almost did tonight. It's natural, _I guess, _but you're _technically _only twelve…! I… I really don't know what to do."

Nico stopped his wandering and sat back down next to Peter.

Wow, the son of Hades and supposed expert on death and souls was at a loss. Peter was so screwed.

"So you're saying sometime in the next ten years—probably sooner than later—I'm just gonna collapse and… be what I just was, and you're not going to be able to bring me back?"

Nico pondered that for a few minutes. "I think I'd be able to bring you back for a lot longer than just ten years. The _problem_ is that you're heading into your prime 'quest' years so to speak, meaning you're going to fight more monsters and go on more adventures in the next decade than you will in the rest of your life combined. I could bring you back, but in a couple weeks, I'm going back to the underworld, and I might not be there if you go down in a fight, or a quest. Even then, as you just experienced, it's gonna take a few minutes to get you moving properly again."

"Meaning if I have an episode while fighting a hellhound, and let the hellhound eat me, there's nothing anyone could do?"

"Yeah pretty much." He admitted. "Plus, I'm not all-knowing. If I'm in the underworld, someone would have to come and contact me on what's happening for me to be of any help."

"Meaning… I have to actually tell people I could drop dead at any moment so they know what to do when it happens."

"Uh, yeah. I suggest Percy and Annabeth, because Annabeth already saw you, and she kind of freaked to Percy, who now knows too. You don't have to tell anyone the specifics, just to call me if it happens again."

Peter groaned. "Fabulous…"

"Come on." Nico chuckled, standing swiftly and gripping Peter tightly under the arm, and heaving him to his feet. He swayed for a moment, still incredibly dizzy and overwhelmed, but Nico held him upright until he gathered himself. "Since I don't much like the idea of walking the unknown dozen or so miles you've managed to put between us and camp, let's take the shortcut, shall we?"

Before Peter could process what he meant by that, everything went dark.

It felt like they'd fallen sideways, only they never hitting the ground, just kept spinning and lurching in a thousand different directions and never stopping. It was freezing, so much so that Peter could feel the arctic atmosphere icing his bones over. He knew it was the shadow world, but it still didn't stop him from marveling on _how_ dark it was. It was like no light or heat ever existed, and for a moment, everything that was or ever would be was the thick black wall pressing in on every corner of his mind.

The absolute worst part was the sounds.

Screaming, cawing, scratching… thousands of monsters everywhere, but Peter couldn't see them, couldn't sense them, like they weren't really there. It felt dangerously crowded and absolutely desolate at the same time.

For a terrifying moment, Nico's hand around his arm disappeared, but then it was back like it'd never left, leaving Peter to wonder if he'd just imagined it.

Suddenly, their feet hit solid ground, and the world flooded back to him. Even though it was the middle of the night, everything was so bright it blinded him. The world was made of neon blues and silvers, not black shadows like it normally was. Compared to the shadow world, the thick of night was like high noon.

He felt nauseas, and had to double over to regain his senses, and Nico gave him a moment, standing perfectly silent.

"Do you always see like this?" Peter asked. "Everything's so bright…"

Nico chuckled. "I've trained myself to see the world differently. Your eyes will adjust back to normal light in time, but stay long enough in the Shadow World, and you'll learn to see things even light can't reveal."

"Wow, that was deep." Peter said half seriously, half mockingly, and Nico burst into laughter.

"Come on, you need to explain to an angry daughter of Athena why you ditched her." He laughed.


End file.
